Horde Calamities. If you find one, run. If you're forced to fight one, run faster. The problem isn't killing them, the problem is surviving the kill. Not even I can travel faster than my mount, and the creatures can number in the tens of thousands.
Let the Empire deal with it, and if needed, you can join the Legions dispatched to eradicate them. But do NOT fight them.
Papyrokinesis lacks power, and I am the weakest of the Archmage, but I will take a sound mind over raw strength any day. Let them call me a coward.
I am alive.
Excerpt from The Beasts of the Dungeon.
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Marcus crested one of the many, many low hills in the region, half expecting to see River Reach in ruins. Or on fire, or empty, or under siege. Instead Elly let out a quiet sigh of relief next to them, and even his unenhanced eyes could see that it was alive and well.
There was the Champion army trying to breach the gates, but that barely counted as a siege.
"I'll deal with it," Marcus said, lightly stretching his back. "You get the army inside?"
Elly shrugged. "Sure. Try to have fun."
"Oh, I will. Love you."
Marcus offered her a smile and teleported straight up, coming down again some two miles away. It wasn't exactly perfect weather for this, but neither was it raining. Or particularly cloudy. So he blinked in and out of existence until he was hovering above the Champions, which were seemingly preparing another charge at the city walls.
Eight, maybe nine thousand? Another few of that in Hounds, but there was no Calamity, and few fliers. Marcus could see Legion colors manning the wall, so he wasn't sure what the problem was, but the Empire was far from incompetent.
It always took a second before gravity got a proper hold over him, so in that timeless moment, he weaved his sixth-tier spatial arcs together. The sphere of cutting, another new name he was trying—Elly hated it, the traitor—bloomed in the center of their ranks. Normally he might have been more efficient, trying to pick out their chieftains and such, but he was well rested.
Some two hundred tightly packed Champions died, and he teleported down again. Then up, and another hundred dead. Down again, up, death, down, up, death. Over and over, until his reserves dropped to below a quarter and very few enemies remained.
He shrugged, returning to Elly. She looked at him when he stared at her. "What?"
"The army hasn't even moved yet."
Elly rolled her eyes. "You've been gone for about two minutes, you teapot. I sent a messenger. Our front lines will be here in about half an hour. And you didn't wait for me to say 'I love you too', so fuck you for that."
"Didn't I?" Marcus shrugged lightly, grinning. "Can't imagine why I'd do something like that. Either way, the Champions are dead."
"I saw, and let's not talk about that. You're really taking the danger out of the Dungeon Break, you know that?"
He snorted. "Tell that to Estin. Or the inevitable Calamity that's going to show up soon. I just know one of them is going to block teleportation, or something. Maybe a field of anti-space."
"Very scientific. Now hurry up and wait. I can already see the Legions pulling back from the wall and assembling near the gate."
Marcus peered into the distance, but the city was still the same vague blur. There was a city, certainly, and he could even roughly tell where it started, but more than that? No. Not without forcefully changing his perception, something he hadn't found a spell for.
And raw manipulation was, at best, painful.
"So should we move ahead of the others?"
Elly shook her head. "Not without a proper honor guard. This isn't a small town or a casual meeting between Archmages. There'll be nobles inside, Generals and soldiers and more. We have to make the right first impression, or they'll make our life difficult."
"What?" He turned to her, raising his eyebrow. "Why in all the Hells would they risk that?"
She scoffed. "Not that kind of difficult. More along the lines of 'you have to help us!' and 'don't you know who I am?' or the ever popular 'I'll do what you tell me to, but badly, which is worse because you won't know that I'm doing it'. If we want to accomplish anything, and especially if we're building the first Gate here, they have to know we're beyond their games."
"That's very cynical," he noted. She glanced at him, and he shrugged. "What? I agree, but it is cynical. You think my show just now helped or hurt?"
"Oh, that helped. Definitely. Couldn't have planned it better myself."
"I'm not entirely sure if that was sarcastic or not."
Elly rolled her eyes again. "It wasn't. Now shush, I'm trying to see if I can listen to them give orders."
Marcus blinked, because the city was miles and miles away, but shrugged. By her scowl it didn't seem to be working, but if she wanted to try, who was he to stop her?
The army did catch up to them about half an hour later, several companies of suspiciously clean soldiers moving at their front. Royal Guards were there too, nearly fifty of them, alongside some hundred Knights. And mages, and Life Enhancement soldiers, and a company of gleaming skeletons, and… and that was pretty much it.
Still, it was a lot. Too much, in his opinion, but Elly seemed to have already arranged their so-called honor guard. He didn't see what guards had to do with honor, necessarily, but whatever.
From there they actually had to walk to the gate, the sheer gall, and Elly basically forced him to ride Xathar halfway through. It was all about image, she said. About presenting the right side of themselves.
He was pretty sure she was just showing off.
When they actually came to the gate, though, he was glad she had. The Legions were out in force, half a dozen companies stationed outside the gate in formation. A group of what he could only call militiamen was with them, standing somewhat to the side, and between each company stood a dozen mages.
It was all centered around two figures, a man and woman. Both Generals, which meant there were at least two Legions inside the city, but even here he could see how tired they were.
When Xathar paused maybe a hundred feet away from the closest soldier, everyone shot to attention. Mages bowed, militiamen saluted, and legionaries slammed swords against their own shields. It was a wave of noise, movement and color, one he hadn't expected nor required.
The two Generals came to him, even though all he'd intended was for a dramatic pause to take place, but Marcus rolled with it. That was usually the smart thing to do, he had found; just pretend that anything and everything that happened was exactly according to your own plans.
It worked much, much better than most people assumed, and only took a complete lack of shame to pull off. Well, that and a minor talent for improvisation.
"Archmage," the left General greeted, bowing her head. The man remained silent, blinking intermittently and not doing much else. "I thank you for your timely rescue, and apologize for my colleague. He gets… confused."
Marcus tilted his head, deciding he didn't want to involve himself in any of that. "You're quite welcome. We bring soldiers, mages and supplies, though we can't spare much food. One of my people is working on that. We also bring the first of the Gates. Or more accurately, are planning to build one in River Reach."
"I see," the General replied, nodding in that way when people didn't. "The Legions are at your disposal, as is the city."
Elly broke in, tone curious. "Shouldn't there be nobles? I assume a Noble House is in charge, at the least, if not a branch family of a Great House?"
"There should be," the woman agreed, tone growing colder. "They have… declined to exit their estate. I and a number of city officials have assumed control."
Marcus grunted. "Drag them out. And arrest them, if you think they warrant it, but don't relinquish control. Can the city garrison thirty five thousand troops?"
"We have space, but food is an issue." The General's smile stretched further than would be considered polite. "And I would be honored to clean house, Archmage. On your authority."
The woman saluted, which set off another round of general acclaim, and Marcus resisted the urge to sigh. It was really getting old being praised for things that barely took any effort.
But at least the city itself didn't disappoint. Oh, it was filled with refugees, crowded with militiamen and the smell could only be described as a stench, but it was alive. Wonderfully, chaotically, alive. The river splitting it in two aided with that, admittedly, but all the same.
Smiths hammered metal in great forges, smoke bellowed from expansive kitchens, and the already mentioned militiamen were everywhere. Their equipment wasn't standardized, the quality fairly low and their training clearly lacking, but they were there. In groups of ten or a hundred, they were there.
The threat of flying Hounds ensured their spears could be seen on every street, and even regular civilians carried weapons. Housewives with cleavers, children with clubs, old men with reforged pitchforks. There was resistance in every place imaginable, from pre-prepared fortifications to block off entire streets to rooftops reinforced with layers of wood.
River Reach would not go gently in that goodnight, and even though Marcus hadn't ever been here before, he felt proud.
The General—who still hadn't introduced herself—had apparently sent out word while he and Elly got a brief tour of the city, because by the time their party got to the small castle at River Reach's center, a line of prisoners were waiting for them.
Marcus looked at the General, who shrugged. "I figured you would like to deal with them now, sir."
"You figured correctly," Marcus agreed, looking them over. Fourteen of them; five children, four teenagers, five adults, and all nobility. He grunted. "Let the children go and make them comfortable. Everyone else stays."
Legionaries carried out the order after a nod from their General, and then there were nine. But the adults appeared to be either drunk or violently hungover, and most of the teenagers weren't any better.
There was one exception, a boy who looked about sixteen and with an enormous bruise on his face. Marcus waved the kid closer, briefly noting that Elly had left them at some point. "What's your name?"
"Garton Agnaw, of the House of Agnaw," the boy replied, bowing his head. "It is an honor, Archmage."
"Everyone else in your family is a child, drunk or otherwise unfit to rule, and your patriarch closed the estate during a crisis. That is, at best, extreme negligence. Explain."
Garton spread his hands, a humorless smile on his lips. "I cannot, Archmage. I protested my father's orders and earned myself this badge of honor now on my face, and our guards proved every inch his equal in their cowardice. By Imperial law, we should be decimated."
"Extreme, but not untrue," the General judged, turning to Marcus. "On your authority, Archmage."
Marcus sighed. "Imprison the cowards and foster their children. Congratulations, Garton. You're now the patriarch of the House of Agnaw. I expect you to rebuild their reputation."
The boy bowed his head, but, to Marcus' surprise, raised it a moment later. Looked him right in the eye, his expression one of absolute calm.
"Leave the children with me, and give me aunt Hellen to raise them. She disliked my father's actions as much as I did."
Marcus looked at the kid, who managed to maintain eye contact, and snorted after a long moment. "So be it. General?"
"The Archmage has spoken. The Forsaken are judged." The woman raised her fist, smashing it against her breastplate. A hundred legionaries copied the gesture in near perfect sync. "We obey."
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"So," Elly began, kicking her feet loudly. He wasn't sure how she did that, but she managed. "The Legions are each at half strength, and the militiamen, while numbering nearly thirty thousand, are mostly untrained. The walls are strong, though, and nearly all the Imperial mages survived. It's not great, but it could be worse."
Marcus hummed, carefully slotting the stone into place. The runic formation thrummed to life before guttering out, making him sigh. He turned to her. "We've been here a week, and that's all you managed to find out?"
"Don't you snap at me," she replied, wagging her finger. Her grin was just wide enough to be mocking. "And I told you it wouldn't be as easy as you'd think."
He grunted, smiling despite himself. "Yes, well, I expected to be further along than halfway. If it takes this long to build each Gate, we're fucked."
Donna returned from her own work on the other side of the stone arch, shaking her head. Marcus tsked. Another improperly carved formation. General Absen—and it had nearly taken her two days to introduce herself, to his amusement—had offered her best mages, but apparently he'd been expecting too much.
Barcus had pointed out that the Legions didn't exactly train runic experts, but still. It was slowing everything down, and it wasn't like he had the qualified personnel himself.
"Cheer up," Elly replied, gesturing to the arch. "It looks impressive. That's half the battle, right?"
He rolled his eyes. "Sure. Should we count the nice stone box they build around it, too? It even goes underground, or so Kleph tells me. Nicely fitted along the outer wall, but not quite inside the city. It's so impressive they're completely enclosing it in a dome of stone, or it will be when they finish the roof."
"That's security." She scoffed. "This is art. Very different."
Marcus sighed. "It's not much of anything, not yet. And oh, look. Your favorite person in the whole wide world is approaching."
Elly didn't turn, because she had probably smelled him minutes ago or some such bullshit, but the teasing grin did slide off her face. Otmon came to a stop some distance from the arch, his head slowly turning upwards to see it in its entirety.
The Vizier turned to them after a long moment, bowing and offering a bland smile. "Construction is going well, Archmage?"
"You know it isn't," Marcus replied, snorting. "Stop needling my wife, or she's going to stab you one day."
Otmon's smile widened slightly. "Many a man would consider it a worthy sacrifice just to get close to her, Archmage."
"Oh great, now you're needling me. Did something good happen, Otmon? You're even more suicidally reckless than normal."
"Such was not my intention," the man replied easily. "But no, nothing has happened. Not yet. But you are starting construction on the Gate network, and that will reflect well on me. Very well."
Elly tilted her head. "Didn't you get assigned here because you have nothing left to live for, and thus wouldn't care if either Marcus and or myself killed you?"
"That is… technically correct," the man allowed, his smile growing somewhat stiff. "It is also not why I am here. I have some advice, if you would care to hear it."
"Out with it, then. This portal isn't going to build itself."
Otmon hummed. "Quite so. Young Garton has been pardoned of his family's crimes. Now Kleph is preparing his growth ceremony, and you plan to give half of its bounty to the city."
"Considering that I have lived through these events, I'm aware. Your point?"
"My point, Archmage, is that it would be better if you gift this bounty directly to House Agnaw and its new patriarch. Instead of relying on the Legions, that is."
Marcus raised an eyebrow, turning more fully to the man. "And why would I do that, exactly? The Legions have the logistical know-how and manpower to actually distribute the wheat, unlike the city itself, which is filled with distinctly less disciplined people."
"Because if you do, Garton would be motivated to pull together what remains of the government, allowing for an increased level of civilian faith in the institution, while also putting the young man further into your debt."
Elly frowned, conceding the point with a nod. Marcus remained silent for a moment longer, finally letting out a sigh. "That's a well reasoned point. Since when are you being helpful, Otmon?"
"I am, as ever, your faithful servant."
Well, that answered nothing. Elly glared at the man for the both of them, which succeeded in scaring him off, and she leaned over his shoulder after watching him leave. "I don't trust him."
"I trust that the Empress needs me, and I trust that he is loyal to the Empress," Marcus replied absentmindedly, already inspecting another piece of the Gate. This one looked promising, at least. "If either of that changes, take care of him as you please."
Elly hummed. "Well, yeah. Of course. But until then he's gathering information about every aspect of our power, both personal and not. How much do you know about how the Empress fights, for example? Because I bet she knows how you fight."
"I'm aware," he replied, sighing. "But there's nothing much I can do about that, not right now. Once Vess has fully set up her intelligence network, that might change. Also, what's with you not warning me about visitors?"
She snorted, turning to look behind herself. Mitzi had entered the dome some seconds before, a group of Royal Guards with her, and the girl looked displeased. Displeased and terrified.
That was unkind, perhaps, but his every attempt to apologize to her about the whole heir thing only made her more afraid. Not the panicked, rash sort of fear, but still. There was dread there, both for him and Elly.
They weren't that scary. Were they?
Marcus sighed again, glancing back at the Gate. The stupid thing was going to take another week to make, at the least, and that's assuming its first test revealed no issues. Which was unlikely, since it's not like he'd done this before.
Oh well. Marcus rose to meet Mitzi, who was no doubt going to ask clarification on something again, and frankly, he would be more than happy to let Elly deal with this whole thing.
But no, his loving wife had promptly denied any part in the plan to make her the heir, and thus decided that it was his problem.
…she'd also dealt with the woman last week, but that was beside the point.
Mitzi joined them, asked about whether the Royal Guards really needed to keep following her, and then went over pretty much every one of the tasks he'd given her. It was nice in a 'being thorough' sort of way, but he had told her to deal with those issues precisely because he didn't want to do so himself.
Marcus turned back to the Gate while his heir talked, an involuntary smile stretching over his face. The Gate. The—temporary—solution against the Dungeon. The start of a new era.
My Gate.
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