The First Lich Lord - Chapter 168

Undead smashed together, their unfeeling bodies crushing each other. The flesh golem’s tore apart dozens at a time, absorbing them and growing. This kind of brutal melee was exactly what they wanted.

“Where are you, Ezekiel?” a distorted voice growled. The massive, corrupted magic emanated from a figure stalking through the middle of his zombies. They weren’t zombies though, not in the technical terms anyways, they were a different kind of animated dead. Flooded with corrupted magic, they had a nasty habit of being uncontrollable and hard to kill.

I scanned the figure from where I stood atop the building with Maxwell, Abimelech, Othniel, Raven, and Fraya.

Talkak

Level: 133

Living Dead: The Forsaken, Freed

The forsaken are powerful undead and rarely seen. They are lethal melee fighters and powerful magic casters. The resentment and anger they harbor toward the one who created them is what has allowed them to shape the form of their body and power. The hatred they hold toward their creator and master is unending. They can be powerful minions, but they should never be trusted by their master. They will always seek to break free and extract their vengeance.

This forsaken has broken free of the shackles that bound him and now seeks to take his terrible vengeance on the world and his former master, Ezekiel the Lich. Embracing the corrupted magic that suffused his body, he has taken his power and hatred and merged them into something terrible. Once he finds his hated creator, nothing will hold him back and his creator’s power will have little effect on him.

“Oooo,” Freya licked her lips. “You made a forsaken, and a good one at that. Can I have him?”

“What?” I asked, looking at her in shock. “I doubt he will follow you.”

“You’re crazy,” Maxwell said. “That man was crazy and fucked up, he deserves this and deserves to be killed again.”

“Come on, you let Raven have pets,” Freya pouted.

“My pets aren’t crazy,” Raven said. “That man is crazy, and he hates Ezekiel, no way you get to keep him with you if keeps trying to kill Zeke.”

“I promise he will behave,” Freya said. I was too confused to even respond, there was a brutal brawl taking place only meters away. And Talkak was wading through them drawn directly towards me. “You don’t get to see forsaken very often, and he’s so strong.” There was a whine in her voice.

“Fine, he’s all yours. Just make the fighting stop. I don’t want to lose more of my troops in a needless battle.”

“Oh goody!” Freya gushed before floating off the roof and heading towards that poor forsaken.

***

“I really don’t like this.” I looked down nervously at the river running through the canyon far below.

“There was no other way for us to get across without trying to force the bridge,” Maxwell said.

“I know…” I wasn’t exactly afraid of heights, but the basket we were sitting in didn’t give me confidence. “How did this even get built in the first place?”

“Well,” Jones said, operating the winch system that ran the basket across the canyon. “A lot of bribes and some disappearances made it happen.”

Underneath the central bridge was a cable system with a large basket underneath. The underworld used it for moving across the canyon unseen. The cable was tucked so tightly underneath the bridge, that even the basket was unseeable from the other bridges. When we had invaded the city, Jones had assured us there would be a way to sneak across the canyon once we were in the city.

“You know, for being a kingdom that’s almost a theocracy run by a church of purity there is a lot of corruption,” Maxwell pointed out.

“The thing about purity,” Jones said, “is that the clergy of Olattee can choose to see it in a lot of different perspectives, many of which line their pockets.”

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We made it to the other side safely, where Othniel was already waiting. He had insisted on going across first with Shamgar and Samson. Along with allowing this sneaky cable to be hidden under the bridge, whoever had done the bribing had also made sure there was a blind spot in the magical detection system underneath the bridge where the cable went into the cliff wall.

The room that Othniel was waiting for me in was surprisingly large. It reminded me of a loading and unloading zone for a gondola. As soon as I disembarked, Jones headed back. There were two of the baskets that could run on the cable at a time, moving in a long loop. It still took several minutes for each trip, but within the hour, all of the Dread Thirteen, with the exception of Abimelech, had joined me.

Fifteen of the advanced eldritch death knights were brought over as well. The bone guard under their command were redistributed for the time being.

A long tunnel led out of the room, following it and climbing a flight of stairs, we found ourselves in a small building several streets away from the bridgehead. Working with Raven, the two of us cast a powerful dark magic spell over the entire group. We would need to move quietly and swiftly. The broad daylight would lessen the effectiveness of the spell, but the hope was that the middle of the day was the least likely time they’d expect us to strike.

“Okay, I have a path,” Raven said as the spell was completed. “Stay close to me and try not to kick anything over.”

Everyone nodded, even the eldritch death knights, to my surprise. Raven led the way. We followed in no particular order, but bringing up the rear was Ehud and De’Barak, ensuring none of the knights fell behind.

The building we left was in the bottom of a larger complex of buildings stacked atop each other forming a kind of compound. The tunnels we followed had split multiple times, but this one would let out closest to our desired destination.

We kept to alleys and back streets as we skirted through Maltis proper, as the locals refer to it. The route Raven and Jones had planned out kept us hidden well. The one street we had to cross was fortunately not busy in the slightest, though I thought I saw a civilian looking questioningly at our crossing.

The spell we cast would conceal us in a darkness that would help us blend into shadows, but in broad daylight, it would stand out as a dark patch seemingly moving through the air. There wasn’t enough time to be more careful, no doubt some priest would soon cast a detection spell.

When we reached our destination, we stopped in an alley. I carefully moved forward and peered out. The street was empty, with the exception of a large force of soldiers stationed at the foot of a bridge. Normally the street would’ve been full of traffic coming and going from the bridge.

The alley we were in was half a block from the foot of the bridge where the guard building stood to one side. A barricade had been built across the bridge. It looked surprisingly stout and well-built for how rapidly it must’ve been thrown up.

Raven disappeared to scout. We had a rough estimate of how many soldiers would be stationed there, but we wanted to make sure there were no hidden surprises. Either way, at this point, we were committed.

I began to cast a death magic spell, along with Tola and Izban. Casting the spell would make us more likely to be detected but that wouldn’t matter in a few moments. We each cast our own spells to lessen the chance of detection, since group casting a more powerful spell would be a sure way for us to be found out.

“There is a group of clerics and priests in a building a street that way,” Raven nodded behind us.

I was holding my spell near completion, not wanting to waste the duration. “Okay, can you handle it if you take Ehud and De’Barak with you?”

“Yes,” Raven assured me.

“Okay. “I will give you a thirty count before we kick things off here, strike while they are distracted.”

“No, I thought I’d announce myself and give them time to prepare,” Raven snarked, and gestured for the two fighters to follow her and they disappeared.

I counted in my head for twenty-five long seconds. Then aloud I said, “Five, four, three, two, one.” As one, the three of us cast our spells and Maxwell opened up with an electric guitar shred.

The death magic washed over the twenty-four of us and we rushed into the light. I dispelled the darkness spell around us. The guards whirled, roughly two hundred of them. We were terribly outnumbered, but individually we were quite a bit stronger. My spell had been a powerful strength enhancement, Tola’s enhanced speed, and Izban’s was a regeneration aura.

The strength enhancement would help us smash our way through their lines with ease, as we were predominantly melee fighters. I was already casting another spell, and eldritch power swirled around me. Though I hadn’t cast this kind of spell before, I knew how to do it.

My absolute mastery of eldritch magic had me finish the spell right before we reached the front line. A wave of purple eldritch power spread out over my allies. Their weapons gained a purple eldritch flame along the blade, eldritch power suffusing their bodies further increasing their speed.

The soldiers barely had time to turn, and the ones stationed on the barricade were caught between us and the defenses. Most importantly, the softer targets stationed behind them, the archers, wizards, and other range fighters, were caught in our charge.

We hit them like a sledgehammer against a pane of glass. Shamgar and Gideon secured our flanks instead of being at the center driving back the soldiers. Dozens of soldiers fell within seconds of the engagement starting. We were already inside their magical defenses, this force was not meant to hold on its own, it was meant to hold long enough for reinforcements to get to it.

Tola’s second spell was another buffing spell, a general effect one that would increase the overall power of all involved. She attached the spell to the barricade so it’s area of effect would stay with the front line. Izban’s next spell was also attached to the barricade, and would raise any fallen bodies within its area of effect.

Purple lightning left Othniel’s hand and hammered into a soldier who had just flung open the guard house door. The lightning chained inside of the building, leaping from soldier to soldier. The crackle of the purple light shown through windows on the second and then third floor.

On the top floor, pure white light that was hard to see the in the daylight blossomed. I reshaped Mercy into its eldritch canon form, seeking a target.