The Duty (Play to Live: Book # 3) (29 page)

Chapter Sixteen

T
he Halls of Heaven. The Phantom Palace of the Head of the Dark Pantheon

Deep space reigned in the Palace's Minor Hall. Not as a result of clever interior design—no, its distant walls were wreathed in genuine star dust, galaxies circling its vaulted ceiling, solar wind blowing through its endless corridors.

The Fallen One had a penchant for space exploration. He couldn't help it. It wasn't his fault that all of the 300 series had been bought up by a gaming corporation and installed into AlterWorld's administration. And he'd very nearly had his chance! AI 408 had been installed on board the ISS 2 space station while AI 214 had been controlling the mobile workstation at a mobile lunar helium-3 quarry already for a year and a half, while finding some spare time to write and publish a bestselling thriller series under the pen name of D. Ros.

Now, however, the Fallen One had more important things to do with his time than reflect on former days. He was lost in concentration, perfecting his Blade of Darkness. This was a challenging task—even for a god—which in his eyes made it ever more interesting. It wasn't often he was faced with a problem that demanded more than a momentary flex of his divine will muscle. Sooner or later, the paths of the Pantheons of Light and Dark were going to cross, that much he realized, and he wouldn't mind having a killer argument—literally—on him for just such an occasion.

An adamant sword would do nicely, but where were you supposed to get one? He'd settle for a dagger even, although it wasn't much fun using it against a longsword—but it didn't look as if anyone was going to offer it to him. What adamant he did have was barely enough to make a three-edged pin for Macaria's gorgeous hair. You can laugh but that's exactly what he was planning to use the remaining adamant on. He'd heard his fair share of dark rumors about the God of Light and his avatar's creepy Lothario practices.

He wished he had more temples, preferably in every town and city, more preferably in the main square, their shimmering domes reaching for the stars. And enough dedicated priests dishing out the Divine quests that sent his congregation out searching for the pinkish grains of the precious metal.

But temples were a problem. At the moment, he only had one—the heart of his religion, his last refuge that he had to guard like his own back in a fight. Same with priests: as the head of a Pantheon, he wasn't entitled to any. The divine hierarchy pyramid was set in stone: the Fallen One, followed by the relatively independent figure of his First Priest, followed by junior Gods and a fine dusting of their own priests. And at the base of their congregation, a greedy crowd demanding freebies while keeping one eye firmly on the enemy camp. Unfortunately, here in AlterWorld religion was a commodity, rational and calculating, leaving no space for true inspired faith.

Having said that, with unique supporters like Max and the young Lena, he could try and shape this world to suit his own needs, breaking the still-supple system and molding it in a more convenient way. But—he had every reason to believe that the fine umbilical cord that still connected the two realties would snap if handled without due care. And severing it would be premature: every day the cord brought them about a thousand new permas and as for new players, twenty times that. Each of these meaning a new channel of mana for one of the AlterWorld gods.

One of the biggest pluses of technogenic worlds was their ability to feed copious amounts of people. Of course you couldn't really call it food, but still. So he had to do everything possible in order to scoop as much of this human resource as he still could. You couldn't rule out the possibility of confronting other realities, either. Being a High God, the Fallen One had a good perception of astral planes. These days, the hair on the back of his neck stood on end every time he sensed the greedy stares of Alien Gods.

The majority of those realities were still stuck in the Dark Ages, so any potential invading armies had to have respective power and efficiency. The grand campaigns of the past like the battle of Agincourt that had found 112 British knights killed paled into insignificance next to the least known episodes of World War II. Whoever had heard of the failed battle of Rzhev that had seen three hundred thousand bodies lain to rest in under a month? Or about the equally unsuccessful Kharkov offensive, with the same amount of casualties dispensed with in under two weeks?

The Fallen One shook his head free of unwanted thoughts and tried to concentrate on his craftwork. His study of artifact and ritual magic had led him to an ingenious solution allowing him to decrease his expenditure of adamant a hundred times. So now he was busy replacing the atoms of mithril with those of adamant by force of will alone, engraving the blade with a complex runic script. The tiny pinkish scale was melting, lending its structure to the divine weapon, its nine layers safely concealed inside the predacious-looking sword. From time to time they shone through, turning the stern metal into a posh-looking Damascus swirled with pink. Just one last effort, adding a complex web of interconnected pictograms that could accumulate strength of their own accord, quadrupling the hits. Then he would take a break and probably a bite to eat... speaking of which, the Fallen One sent a mental request to Macaria the Beautiful.

She hadn't been idle, either. She had expressed a great interest in her partner's affairs—as any man's better half should—even joining him in his hour-long studies of Ritualistics. Now she sat in front of an enormous mirror, piecing together a complex design on her own forearm using the colorful handful of gems that lay in front of her. Obeying the goddess' will, two perfect tiny emeralds hovered in the air, landing on the girl's velvety skin and finishing the design by becoming the two eyes of a little dragon.

Macaria tilted her head to admire the pretty tattoo. Mentally she reached into the astral world, taking in as much mana as she could. The palace walls wavered with the energies displaced. The Fallen One winced, fencing himself off with phantom shields.

"Oops," the goddess whispered apologetically. She lowered her head and gingerly breathed life into the dragon.

Its mischievous little eyes opened. A curious head turned around, two little wings fluttering like mad. The little dragon stirred and slid up the girl's delicate skin, right under the cleavage of her silk blouse, tickling and making her shrug her shoulders. All done! Another brick in the wall of her strength and survival. Any enemy who had the stupidity to disregard the tattoo as innocent was in for a few nasty surprises.

And if the design had anything in common with a certain familiar—the one that she'd spotted while half-heartedly chaperoning a particular wayward First Priest and spinning the threads of his fate—well, there's no crime in that, is there?

Sensing the Fallen One's call, the girl rose and snapped her fingers, changing the room's décor to a cozy medieval banquet hall. Wincing her disapproval—the God's consorting with his First Priest had done his culinary tastes no good—she took the path of least resistance, materializing a crystal bowlful of the Russian salad that she'd unceremoniously pilfered from one of AlterWorld's kitchens. How could they eat that, for crissakes?

Stealing a furtive look around, the goddess dug a delicate finger into the salad and scooped out a hefty blob. Mmm. Actually, not that bad at all. Thoughtfully she licked her finger, then shook her heavy mane of hair and created another bowl, a carbon copy of the first one.

"Okay, so I'm sorry," she apologized to the unknown cook, sending her a generous handful of Sparks of Divine Presence. "May everything you cook turn out awesome. We promise you to sample it every time..."

Boom!
The space around her reared up like an ocean cruiser colliding with an iceberg, knocking Macaria off her feet. The Fallen One sat up in alarm. The bowlfuls of salad crashed onto the floor in slow motion, their tasty contents turning into ugly gooey heaps studded with shards of crystal.

"What happened?" Macaria clambered to her feet, trying hard to keep her balance on the seemingly possessed floor.

The Fallen One didn't answer, busy listening to something. With rapid sleight of hand he wiped the astral plane clean of the castle's energy imprint, removing the interference. He raised his hand again, and a gigantic hologram of two planets appeared over his and Macaria's heads. The blue Earth and the AlterWorld, yellow with spots, were floating apart, tugging the umbilical cord so taut it sang.

Dong!
yet another thread snapped, causing space around them to quiver.

Twang,
a few more busted, unable to sustain the celestial spheres' countermovement.

"What the f-" the Fallen One growled and threw up his hands, reaching into the astral planes and scooping up generous amounts of mana, disregarding the side effects of this emergency siphoning technique which immediately began freezing out space around him.

Obeying the god's will, the ocean of mana thickened, gaining some structure. Its soft sheets shifted to block the two receding realities' paths, slowing them down.

"More mana!" the Fallen One croaked. All of his power wasn't enough to prevent his hands from spreading wider apart.

Macaria gave a silent nod and closed her eyes, turning into a fuel pump, siphoning off mana from wherever she could find it and sending it on to her partner. She frantically emptied everything she could think of: her own stocks, the Altar, any uncategorized location bosses, all stationary accumulating crystals within her reach, draining them all dangerously flat. Her mind barely registered the stir in the camp of the Gods of Light as they turned their anxious stares to the scene.

"More!" the Fallen One wheezed, his face crimson with the strain as blue veins bulged on his forehead.

Petrified, Macaria stared at her man in awe as he shifted realities, changing the worlds' coordinates and the balance of the divine forces.

She nodded and reached deep, scooping out generous handfuls. She felt no pity as thousands of accumulators crumbled into dust leaving castles unprotected, while magical creatures dropped dead and various energy life forms dissolved without a trace. For the first time in her life, Macaria was giving it her all, pumping enormous amounts of energy through her own being and forcing her own channels to expand—deforming them but growing much stronger in the process.

She couldn't tell how long it had lasted until a voice forced its way into her mind, bringing her back to reality.

"Enough! I said enough! We've done it! We've stopped them."

"Oh," she gasped, collapsing to her knees. "What was that?"

With a warm smile, the Fallen One sniffed his bloodied nose. "That was a perma in labor. That was this world's first baby coming into being. Which makes us his godparents, I suppose..."

Deep below, a new mother lovingly swaddled her baby in the silk of the Cursed House's banner and, overtaken by her awakened instincts, hurried to unbutton the blouse on her suddenly heavy and warm breasts.

A couple of hundred miles further to the north, a very thoughtful First Priest was meditating on the message in front of him,

Congratulations! The First Temple's Altar has reached level 4!

Current Faith Points: 12,415. Faith Points left till next level: 4,181,069.

Mana flow: 9,000 per sec. Already accumulated: 21,551. Maximum capacity: 90,000,000

* * *

It had been a good ten hours that the united Chinese clan forces had been chasing us around the Frontier. No matter what we did, they kept tightening the noose. We'd closed our ranks as we moved in an intentionally wrong direction, never letting our guard down, while six ranger groups led by wizards stole toward our destination, setting up beacons as they went. Then with a quick portal jump we'd find ourselves a few miles closer to our objective.

Still, the Chinese too had their fair share of smart guys. They must have worked out our general direction as rangers started walking into traps and ambushes. Our men reported sightings of the enemy forces, portal activity and an indecent amount of observers. Our jumps were becoming shorter and more frequent, and in the last half-hour even I could easily eyeball constant activity in the nearby hills. They had to be shepherding us somewhere, definitely into a trap, while their forces were busy preparing a warm welcome to the cheeky Russians, consolidating enough power to teach us a good lesson.

Several times Widowmaker had cast an expectant glance at me, waiting for my order to abort the raid. We'd set up plenty of beacons to try again in a week or two once the Asians had turned their attention to other things. But time was an issue here. I didn't have a week, as simple as that. Besides, adding a strategic retreat to our respective CVs would have been a lousy finale for an initially successful campaign.

Our last jump had taken us to a spacious oasis. We stood in the shade cast by the ruins of an ancient wall on top of a low hill. No idea what it had been before: a castle or even the Great Fence of China forging its way through the desert. The only fortification still standing was that one wall, battered and lonely, that arose from behind one dune only to cross the oasis and disappear into the dunes opposite.

Oh well. An elevated terrain, some fortifications, a small valley. Actually, a perfect place for one final slam of the door! As Riddick eloquently put it,
we can't leave without saying goodnight
. Pointless to drag our gangster friends all the way back to the Lost City: they were bound to stab us in the back at the least opportune moment. It was much better to stop while we were still strong enough and face our adversary, meeting him with a stiff uppercut instead of waiting for them to catch up with us and kick our asses.