97 XCVII. 'The Siege of Marshrock...'

At this distance, Marshrock was a hulking lump on the dark horizon. Dimas could hardly make it out, excepting only when lightning flashed and lit up the entirety of Luzo.

He adjusted the hood of his long raincoat, ensuring it was snug enough to hold his front-brimmed helmet in place and keep the rain out of his eyes. He knew that he'd also have to compensate for the added weight of his heavy combat boots and aramid fiber vest. Truthfully, he would've preferred to just wear his usual suit and tie, but his mother wouldn't allow it.

Technically, he was wearing clothes that she had personally prepared for him. He supposed that was one way to feel young again.

'Are you sure you don't want to take anyone with you?' asked Iziol.

'Yes,' said Dimas. There were a variety of abilities that could achieve flight, but some had an easier time of it than others, and even fewer had his level of control. Instead, he had already ordered Lorenzo Delaguna and cousin Carlos to begin their assault after he completed the first objective.

His boots lifted gently off the rooftop, and Iziol grabbed onto his back. He strengthened his entire body with his soul, flexed his folded arms, breathed deep and fully exhaled, and then rocketed off into the sky.

Marshrock wasn't that far, so there was no need to break the sound barrier. His view of the enormous fortress soon became much clearer. It really was a giant boulder with a few towers poking out from the top.

For the moment, he was not concerned with the castle itself. Instead, he turned upward and climbed toward the clouds. Lightning flashed again, only this time, it hit him.

This was expected. He was prepared for the impact with an invisible field of concentrated gravity. And yet, it still wasn't enough to trivialize the lightning. The sheer force of it knocked him off course, making him stagger in the air as electricity surged all through his body. After a moment, however, he regained his composure and kept climbing.

Dimas reached the clouds and stopped. He saw more electricity crackling within that dark fog, brewing up another bolt.

This was the first objective. His troops didn't need the added distraction of a lightning storm, and the underground units would no doubt appreciate a break from the rain while they worked.

He gathered his power into his hand and punched a hole straight up through the clouds. Then his gravity bomb went off. Space bubbled and distorted as gravitic force gathered and then suddenly reversed outward, sending a visible shock wave horizontally through the sky and dispersing all clouds for at least a kilometer in each direction.

Sunlight poured through the opening, lighting up the city below and making its many domed buildings glisten. He could see the rain still falling like a curtain all around the hole he'd made.

The spectacle signaled the beginning of the assault for his comrades.

He released the orb of gravity around himself and plummeted into freefall, straight back down toward Marshrock's looming form. When he drew near enough, he pulled up and soared around the castle's upper reaches for a clearer view of its exterior.

'Can you sense the Elroy children?' said Dimas.

'No,' said Iziol. 'Melchor empowered the rock with his soul. I can't tell where anyone inside it is.'

'What if I make a hole?'

'It'd have to be a pretty big hole. Bigger than you'd be able to make, most likely. There's a reason Marshrock isn't just a pile of rubble after all these years.'

A part of Dimas wondered about that, but another part knew that this was not the time to be putting his pride to the test. 'Not a big hole, then. Many small ones.'

'That might work. You are going to piss off a lot of people, though.'

'That is the job, is it not?'

'So it is. But do be careful.'

He swooped down lower, just above a suspended extension on the western side. He mustered a gravitational bubble around his right hand. It pulsated, and he knew it was ready. He drew up close to the protruding tower and slammed his fist through it with force enough to make the entire extension crumble.

He'd been prepared to catch any hapless personnel that had been inside and take them hostage, but none had been there. Instead, he saw that the corridor that led into the rock had already been sealed off.

'I know I said small, but you'll have to do better than that,' said Iziol.

Dimas hovered there a moment. '...Very well, then.'

Dimas soared up high again. He could already see the clouds beginning to crowd back in on the hole he'd made. It would only be about half an hour until he needed to make it again, he knew.

He started plummeting back down toward the castle another time, gathering gravity around both hands and then combining them into one.

'Uh, Dimas, that might be a little too much...'

Dimas propelled himself even faster than freefall, veered horizontally along the top of the rock, and then barreled into it with both hands, releasing the gravitic force upon impact.

He tore through the rock like cardboard, gouging out a small valley of crumbling stone. He swooped back up into the sky to inspect his work.

Iziol sighed. 'I really need to teach you how to find the happy medium in things.'

Dimas moved closer to the craggy scar. Impressive as it was, it still hadn't made that much of a dent in Marshrock. The upper rock was so thick that the attack hadn't even broken through to a chamber or hallway.

'I sense someone close,' said Iziol. 'Eastern tower. Someone just exited.'

He turned and saw the man on the highest balcony there. Dimas recognized the flat face and pug nose from the picture he'd seen earlier. Horatio Blackburn.

The man shouted up at Dimas, exuberant enough to easily be heard over the bracing wind, "Could I ask you to kindly stop attacking my home?!"

Dimas let Iziol handle the response.

'We would love to do that for you! Just as soon as you release your hostages!'

Horatio gave a lame shrug. "I'm afraid that's not my call!" The man's friendly smile was entirely out of place, given the circumstances, and it reminded Dimas of a certain loud-mouthed Redwater. A loud-mouthed Redwater who had better still be alive. "Even so, I would really like to avoid fighting you!" said Horatio. "So I'm not going to attack first! I'm just going to stand here and hope that you go in peace, amergo!"

And they waited--Dimas hovering above and looking down, while Horatio only stood there and steadily met his gaze with a wide grin.

'Oi,' said Iziol privately. 'I wasn't prepared for politeness.' A beat passed. 'In fact, this is worse than being attacked. This is diabolical.'

'...Are you ordering me to stand down?'

'Agh. No.'

'...So I should attack him, then?'

'No!'

'Iziol...'

'Just wait,' said Iziol. 'I'm thinking.'

Dimas waited.

'Try insulting him.'

'...What?'

'See if you can goad him into attacking us first.'

Dimas nearly gave a mental sigh.

'Call him a... a turkey. Maybe that'll get a rise out of him.'

'...No, Iziol.' The sad part was, he knew the reaper wasn't joking.

'Dimas, come on, help me out here. I hate having to be the bad guy. You can even use a crude word, if you like. A pissing turkey, maybe. Oh, or would that be too harsh? I don't want to hurt his feelings.'

'...I'm attacking him now.'

'Dimas!'

'I'll remember to feel bad about it later.' And without any warning to Horatio, he shoved one hand forward and launched a gravity wave at the man.

However, Horatio was prepared. With an extended hand of his own, a sudden explosion appeared in the wave's path. It was large enough to neutralize Dimas' attack, though a cloud of dust particles washed back over Horatio's tower before the man dematerialized his work.

Dimas did not let up. He pressed forward with both hands this time and forced Horatio to either leap off the balcony or be shredded along with it. Horatio retaliated with targeted dust explosions as he dropped down to the uneven rock below.

'Dimas, how can you be so heartless?! You're a monster!'

'Shut up, Iziol.'

Horatio's reaper appeared from the gaping hole in the tower and latched onto the man's back. To Dimas' eyes, reapers were small wyverns--winged and dragon-headed, but with only two legs and a double-barbed fishtail.

Dimas never stopped moving and fired off a series of gravity bullets that Horatio couldn't see until he'd already been riddled with bloody holes. Another moment may have been enough to finish him off right then and there, but an explosion caught Dimas square in the chest and sent him spiraling off course with an impressive hole in his vest. His raincoat flapped wildly as he brought himself to a hard stop in mid-air. He could feel a rib out of place, but the vest had more or less done its job. Pity it could only take one hit, though.

'That's what you get for attacking first.'

'Iziol, please--'

'I sense more approaching. I believe it is time for us to go harass some other part of the castle.'

That information, Dimas could appreciate.

He fled. It would have been nice to capture Horatio, especially considering their files didn't have much information on him, but Dimas would probably need to use pan-moc in order to do so, and it was much too early into the siege to be going all out. If he didn't conserve his strength, he and Iziol would end up too exhausted to fight when they were truly needed. 'Were you able to analyze Horatio's ability?'

'No,' said Iziol, apparently focused on their mission again. 'There was too little to go on. I would need to see what else he can do with it.'

From his vantage point above, Dimas could see more Blackburns pouring out of Marshrock from different places. No doubt, Carlos and Lorenzo would be in need of his assistance very soon. He dove back down to go look for them.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

The ground above them trembled, and trails of twinkling dust shook loose from the freshly materialized ceiling.

'Sounds like the battle has started,' said Garovel privately.

Their underground party numbered eight strong. Him and the three Najirs, along with four Rainlords--two destruction users for the tunneling and two integration users for the construction of the net.

Hector had carefully slung his shield over his back, positioned low so that it couldn't accidentally touch his bare neck and cause the pain that Sazandara had warned him about. It felt a little awkward there, but as long as he didn't need to sit down, he figured he'd be fine.

All things considered, Hector wasn't sure how much use he would be here. If they got attacked, the onus of protecting them would largely fall upon Lord Asad. But then, he supposed that was nothing new to him. It seemed like he was always relying on better fighters to do the real work. Hector just hoped he'd be able to find some small way of helping.

Asad also decided to handle the maintenance of the tunnel. Mushy didn't even begin to describe the ground here, and Hector could see veins of muddy water through the transparent ceiling and walls--which Asad made from crystallized quartz, according to Garovel's assessment.

They'd only just begun, but so far, progress seemed smooth. Flashlight in hand, Hector looked at his copy of the map, which said that their first checkpoint was located fifty meters from where they'd started. The net itself would form a rough circle beneath a section of the city, capturing not just Marshrock but also a few of the neighborhoods around it. One of the other tunneling parties would have to go through a river, Hector noticed. He didn't envy that group.

When they reached the first objective, Hector observed the integration users at work. Together, they'd brought along immense lengths of uninsulated cables and a duffel bag full of compact electrical devices. They'd been laying the cables down as the tunnel progressed, but they only now stopped to plant one of the devices into the ground. Then they attached cables to the device and used their abilities to somehow craft a barricade around the device.

Hector had a number of fresh questions for Garovel and decided to start with the broadest one. 'So, uh... what are they doing, exactly?'

'Making limiters for the soul net,' said Garovel.

'Limiters?'

'Yeah. Ever wonder what happens when you try to empower an energy field with your soul?'

'Er. I'm not even sure what that means.'

'Then this won't be an easy explanation.'

'Hmm. I'm sure you can do it.'

'Ha. Well, I suppose I'll start at the beginning. Quite a long time ago, something like a soul net would have been considered impossible. We only knew that servants could empower physical mass with their soul, and we thought that things like light and electricity didn't have mass, but as was later discovered, they do--it's just such a small mass that there isn't enough to attach a soul to. If you tried, the soul power that you expended would just bleed out into the air and attempt to fill the entire body of gas that makes up the planet's atmosphere. Which is impossible to do, by the way. It's simply too big for even the most powerful servant's soul to fill. It'd be equivalent to spitting into an ocean.'

'Okay, I'm with you so far...'

'Anyhow, it was later discovered that soul power CAN occupy an energy field, as long as that field is strong enough within a contained area. Relativistic mass plays a role here, but that's probably more complicated than is worth going into right now. Simply put, a soul net is an energy field that has been empowered with someone's soul.'

'Uh, alright...'

'In this case, the Rainlords look like they're going to use a magnetic field. Those devices they're carrying are most likely protective relays, which will serve to prevent the net from overloading--and possibly also amplify the electric current that will run along these cables. Someone will empower the current with their soul, and since the magnetic field is a product of that current, it will also be empowered.'

'Huh. I think I understand... mostly.' Hector scratched his neck. The integration users had completed their work, and the tunneling party was making headway again.

'There are various ways to go about making a net,' said Garovel. 'Generally, you want your strongest combatant to empower the net so as to make it as durable as possible. Opponents will often try to break nets with EMPs and the like.'

'Can't the enemy just break these relays or whatever?'

'They sure can. That's where the integration users come in. They conceal their work so that the opponent won't have such an easy time locating the net's weak points.'

'Er... I'm still kinda unclear about what the integration type actually is,' said Hector. 'I know that it fuses materials together, but, uh... how?'

'Are you sure this is the time and place to be asking about all these different things? I can't help but feel you'd retain the information better when we aren't in mortal peril.'

'Maybe, but... uh... I mean, as long as we're not being attacked right this second, it seems like as good a time as any to me.'

Garovel gave a small shrug. 'Fair enough, I suppose. Integration involves elements like materialization and transfiguration do, but it differs in that a single integration user can eventually learn to work with any number of different elements. An integrator starts off with only two elements already in their repertoire, and they have to manually acquire more from there.'

'How do they do that?'

'By using a hyper-state. Which is a whole different conversation, really, but the short of it is that integration and mutation users have a hyper-state called "pan-wzrost" which lets them learn to use new materials.'

'Hyper-states again... eesh. How many are there, anyway?'

'Four. Pan-rozum, -forma, -moc, and -wzrost. Rozum is the most difficult to use; wzrost is the easiest; forma and moc are about the same.'

'...I guess I need to know what they all do, huh?'

'Probably.'

'Ugh...'

Garovel chortled. 'What happened to that eagerness to learn you had earlier?'

'This is different. This shit is all, like... I mean, I'm nowhere close to using any of it, right? So... it's just...'

'Materialization can only use pan-forma and pan-rozum. But yes, they're both quite impossible for us, currently. I can save the explanation for later. Though, I do get the feeling we'll be seeing them in action fairly soon. I'd bet anything that Asad can at least use pan-forma.'

Hector could hear more rumbling from aboveground. Part of him wondered if he wouldn't have been more useful up there with Lord Dimas.

'The hyper-states aren't so difficult to remember, though. Forma goes with the mass abilities; moc goes with the wave abilities; and wzrost goes with the mixture abilities. Oh, and rozum goes with them all.'

'Uh-huh...' And then Hector paused, squinting. 'Hey, wait a minute.'

'What?'

'Mutation. You know how they develop their powers now. Back when I first asked you about mutation, you said you didn't know any of the details.'

'Your memory must be playing tricks on you.'

'No, I definitely remember.'

'Nah. That never happened. Trust me. I'm Garovel. The smart one, in other words.'

'...You had one of the other reapers explain it to you while I was unconscious, didn't you? Who was it? Voreese? Mehlsanz?'

'I've always known, Hector. In fact, I'm actually omniscient. I just didn't tell you before because you obviously weren't ready for the incredible truth. But I'm glad I can finally reveal my secret to you now. Concealing my all-knowing super-coolness can be such a burden.'

'Hmm. Wait, was it last night? Is that why you put me to sleep so suddenly when you were talking to Qorvass?'

'I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about.'

Hector shook his head and smirked. 'Then you obviously don't know everything, do you?'

'It's just that one thing. Everything else, I totally know. Go on. Ask me anything.'

Hector took a second to deliberate. 'How many raindrops are above Sair at this very moment?'

'Sixty-one billion, three hundred and forty-nine million, two hundred and fifty-two thousand, one hundred and thirty-three,' said Garovel. 'Now, how do you intend to check if I'm wrong, exactly?'

'...Shit.'

'See? That proves it. I really am omniscient.'

'I'm sorry I doubted you.'

That seemed to catch Garovel off guard, making the reaper laugh publicly. It drew a few strange looks, but no one said anything. Hector did notice, however, that Asad's daughter was watching them now. Those golden eyes were easy to spot even in this relative darkness.

Despite being in their presence non-stop for the last thirty straight hours or so, Hector hadn't been able to figure the Najirs out at all. Jada seemed slightly more outgoing than her aunt, but that wasn't saying much. Both of their reapers seemed equally content to simply follow Qorvass in silence.

Hector wondered what they thought of him. Maybe they thought they'd be better off without him. And maybe they'd be right. These people obviously knew what they were doing. Of course they wouldn't need him.

No. He couldn't fall into that old thinking again. That wouldn't help anything. He wasn't here to prove himself to a bunch of people he barely knew. He was here to help Garovel's sister. He just had to remember that. After all his meditating, his practicing and studying, his fighting and struggling and winning and losing--after all of that in the last eight months, he wasn't the same person as before. And he knew it. Even if it was easy to forget, he knew he was different.

He just hoped that difference was for the better, meager though it might be.

The party continued on, listening to the destruction users burrow their way through the mud. And it was slightly weird, Hector realized. He'd heard it before, of course, but he'd never really stopped and listened closely to the actual sound that destructive paths made. It was a kind of faint piping noise, almost musical even, like a brief gust of air through a tube.

He also noticed that their tunnel had a gradual slope to it, taking them continually deeper underground, probably to avoid the city's utility lines and ensure that the soul net would run below any basement levels that Marshrock possessed. It would've been more convenient if there were some type of subway network to work from, but Hector doubted such a thing existed anywhere within the Rainlords' domain. If it did, it'd probably be more of a submarine network or something, he figured.

At length, Hector noticed the reapers all stop at the same time.

'A number of unfamiliar souls are heading our way,' announced Qorvass.

'Eighteen by my count,' said Garovel.

Asad took that as his cue. "Keep going," he told the four Rainlords, who voiced no objection. Then he turned to his sister. "Imas, protect them and construct the tunnel in my place."

Imas and her reaper both nodded and moved into Asad's previous position.

"Jada, Hector, you're with me."

Jada and Hector nodded as well.

"A vertical hole, please," ordered Asad, and one of the Rainlords punched a path through the roof of the tunnel. Asad lined the walls with quartz as Jada and Hector gathered around him, and then the Lord Najir pushed the three of them up on a crystal platform.

With his flashlight, Hector could see a second pillar of quartz above them, pushing up and clearing the rest of the way to the surface. They popped up in the middle of a street. It was no longer raining, thanks to an apparent hole in the overcast sky, but the pavement was still plenty damp.

Hector pocketed his flashlight and removed the shield from his back, then began materializing fresh iron armor for himself, beginning with the helm--which was something of a relief to be wearing again. He'd been aching for something to hide behind ever since leaving Warrenhold. Decorum aside, he wondered how feasible it would be to just start wearing armor all the time. Considering he could simply dematerialize it whenever it became an inconvenience, maybe...

Hector had to concentrate. He was going for a genuine, complete set of plate armor, this time. It had taken him so long to study and comprehend all of the ins and outs of a full suit, but he was finally there. More or less. He'd occasionally tested his mobility in it during his downtime and patrols around Gray Rock, and it seemed to do well enough, but he had obviously not been able to test it against a true opponent yet. It certainly seemed to scare the hell out of the few criminals who'd seen it, though.

He didn't take shortcuts with it, either. The temptation was to simply coat himself in iron wherever he didn't need to worry about his joints or flexibility, but he knew that partial coatings would hang too loosely over his clothes and would not interlock with the other pieces of the armor. So he made sure that his ridged breastplate linked properly to the pauldrons, which linked to the segmented rerebraces, then to the spiked couters, then to the gauntlets--or rather, gauntlet, as he kept his left hand unarmored and also pulled off his glove there. He would need bare skin available on a moment's notice in order to use Haqq's shield to its fullest potential.

'Don't touch the shield directly until I tell you to,' Garovel said privately.

'Okay.'

The neck had been a bit of an issue, but he'd managed to come up with a gorget that allowed him to turn his head, and he'd also perforated the faceguard of his helm for a bit more visibility.

Next came the faulds and modified tasset, which protected Hector's waist and crotch, respectively. Together, they basically looked like a metal skirt, though Garovel assured him that they made him seem very intimidating and manly. Hector wasn't too concerned either way, as long as they shielded his balls.

The piece covering his ass was called the culet, which had been perhaps the most difficult thing to find in his studies. There weren't many pieces of plate armor designed for the ass, probably because knights in full plate historically fought on horseback. Ultimately, he'd decided that a culet was slightly more practical than materializing a horse.

For his thighs, there were cuisses; for the knees, poleyns; and for the shins, greaves. All easy enough. And for his feet, he simply created a series of riveted plates, called lames, over the top of his shoes. He certainly didn't want to lose the superior traction of his modern footwear, especially on this already slick ground.

All together, it was heavy as shit. Which was another strike against wearing it all the time, he supposed. But of course, he would be cheating with undead strength as soon as the fight started. The knights of ye olden times must have been monsters to be able to fight like this. But then, as he thought about it more and remembered how long reapers and servants had been around, he began to wonder if they actually had been monsters.

'Hey, Asad, would you mind?' said Garovel, motioning toward Hector. 'Lend us a bit of your soul.'

Asad paused when he saw Hector. "Interesting," was all he said before pressing a tattooed hand against the iron. After a few moments, he removed his hand and said, "That should last about fifteen minutes."

"Th-thank you..."

"You are welcome." Asad crafted a glassy helmet for his daughter and handed it to her. "Tell me what I need to hear."

Jada donned the gift immediately. "Only as a last resort," she said. Her hands rustled beneath her dark robe for a second, and then she revealed a handgun. "Otherwise, I will provide support from a distance."

"Good. I will be fine on my own, so concentrate on helping Hector."

"Yes, abbi."

Asad did not bother creating a helmet for himself, Hector noticed, despite still having time to spare.

'They are surrounding us,' warned Qorvass.

Hector could see them approaching now.