61. Fighting Fire With Fire (VI)

Neal came close enough to Inspect. He was a thin man, sharply featured, with the sort of face that seemed to be scowling even at rest. Right now it was not at rest.

It was trained on Zane, and it was drawn tight with anger.

ℕ𝕖𝕒𝕝 𝔼𝕝𝕝𝕚𝕠𝕥𝕥 (ℂ𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕖)

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟟𝟝

ℂ𝕝𝕒𝕤𝕤: 𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕖 𝔸𝕣𝕔𝕙𝕞𝕒𝕘𝕖

𝕃𝕒𝕨𝕤:

𝕄𝕒𝕛𝕠𝕣 𝕃𝕒𝕨 𝕠𝕗 𝔼𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕝 𝔽𝕝𝕒𝕞𝕖𝕤 (𝔼𝕝𝕖𝕞𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕒𝕝 𝕃𝕒𝕨 𝕠𝕗 𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕖)

𝕂𝕖𝕪 𝕊𝕜𝕚𝕝𝕝𝕤:

ℂ𝕖𝕝𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕒𝕝 𝕀𝕟𝕗𝕖𝕣𝕟𝕠 (𝔸𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖) [ℝ𝕒𝕣𝕖]

𝔻𝕣𝕒𝕨𝕤 𝕖𝕟𝕖𝕣𝕘𝕪 𝕗𝕣𝕠𝕞 𝕔𝕖𝕝𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕒𝕝 𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕤 𝕝𝕚𝕜𝕖 𝕤𝕠𝕝𝕒𝕣 𝕖𝕔𝕝𝕚𝕡𝕤𝕖𝕤, 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕖𝕥𝕤, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕡𝕝𝕒𝕟𝕖𝕥𝕒𝕣𝕪 𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕘𝕟𝕞𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕤 𝕥𝕠 𝕦𝕟𝕝𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕙 𝕕𝕖𝕧𝕒𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕤𝕡𝕖𝕝𝕝𝕤 𝕠𝕗 𝕗𝕚𝕣𝕖.

ℝ𝕖𝕓𝕚𝕣𝕥𝕙 𝕚𝕟 𝔽𝕝𝕒𝕞𝕖 (𝔸𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖) [𝔼𝕡𝕚𝕔]

𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕖 𝕕𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕪𝕤, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕗𝕚𝕣𝕖 𝕣𝕖𝕞𝕒𝕜𝕖𝕤. ℝ𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕠𝕣𝕖𝕤 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕣𝕖𝕘𝕣𝕠𝕨𝕤 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕨𝕙𝕚𝕔𝕙 𝕨𝕒𝕤 𝕝𝕠𝕤𝕥.

𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕗𝕚𝕣𝕖 𝕊𝕒𝕔𝕣𝕚𝕗𝕚𝕔𝕖 (𝔸𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖) [𝔼𝕡𝕚𝕔]

𝔹𝕦𝕣𝕟𝕤 𝕠𝕟𝕖'𝕤 𝕝𝕚𝕗𝕖𝕤𝕡𝕒𝕟 𝕚𝕟 𝕖𝕩𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕒 𝕞𝕒𝕤𝕤𝕚𝕧𝕖 𝕤𝕦𝕣𝕘𝕖 𝕠𝕗 𝕕𝕖𝕞𝕠𝕟𝕚𝕔 𝕡𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣. 𝕆𝕟𝕝𝕪 𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕥𝕠 𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕤𝕖 𝕨𝕙𝕠 𝕓𝕠𝕟𝕕𝕖𝕕 𝕥𝕠 𝔸𝕫𝕖𝕣𝕠𝕥𝕙.

"Die!" snarled Neal. He raised his arms to the high heavens.

The sun's rays shot into him. They sped up as they got close till they were thin gold lines shooting through him. They poured in all over in their thousands, a corona of pinprick lights. And he began glowing an eerie black light.

Zane recognized it. It seemed to be the same Celestial Inferno Skill his son had used, but at a much higher Tier.

As it charged, Zane got out an Axe and stacked it with Laws of Sharpness.

Neal blasted the beam. And Zane chucked his Axe to greet it. Flaming Axe met a ray of light.

The Axe cleaved the beam down the middle. One beam went left, the other right.

The beam going right hit plain dirt and exploded. The beam going left hit Kyle right in the face.

Zane thought he heard a shriek; the beam stopped for a moment, finished off what was there, and kept going. It wiped out the Mages behind Kyle too.

By the time Neal stopped the Skill, they'd all been charred to dust.

Kyle Elliott's headless body flopped to the ground. Neal and Zane both stared at it.

Then Kyle dissolved into essence. And flowed right into his dumbstruck, shaking father.

Neal choked. For a few seconds, he hovered there trembling.

Then he turned twitching to Zane. "YOU!" He screamed. "I'll KILL YOU!"

Which seemed rather unfair to Zane. Whose fault was that really? Kyle's essence hadn't gone to Zane, had it?

But Neal Elliott was beyond reason. He seemed deranged, which… Zane could understand, given the circumstances.

Neal began to glow a deep red, a red like dried blood.

"I prayed," he choked out, "To the demon Azeroth, ruler of the Void Planet. In exchange for a fraction of my soul, he granted me powers forbidden to man! Savage Sage! Bear witness to TRUE MIGHT!"

And he began to expand. Demon horns reared out of his skull. Bat-like wings broke through his back, gaining new bones, swelling faster and faster. Every limb of his blew up, growing gnarled and scaled and dark. Twice its size, thrice, four times…

"Witness my SACRIFICE!" he raged.

Zane cocked a brow. "You're burning your life force?"

"All of it!" shrieked Neal. His eyes bulged. The veins stuck out stark red. "It'll all be worth it if you BURN IN HELL WITH ME!"

Now, Zane had a few Levels on him. And a Signature Title. And two extra Major Laws. But still... that was a lot of Aura. It was starting to swell larger than his own…

Oh, my. He was getting nervous.

The good kind of nervous—the kind of nervous that put a smile on his face.

Neal Elliott was going all out. Zane figured he should too.

Neal was still growing—he'd blown up to the size of a skyscraper now. Batlike black wings speared out of his back, dwarfing the horizon. His face distended, drawing outward, warping into something between a human's and a dragon's. His eyes burned crimson in his skull, smoldering like dying embers.

He reared up, bellowing a deep furious note. And pitch-black fire leaked from his mouth.

He was gathering his powers for one all-out blow.

Zane did the same.

He started loading essence into his Axes. He threw on the Major Law of Absolute Sharpness, he threw on the Major Law of Scorched Wrath, and all through his body he weaved the Major Law of Unyielding Might. His Axes started glowing blistering hot. So did the black star of flame in Neal Elliott's hideous mouth.

Zane leaped into the air.

They threw at the same time.

A furious black beam shot out at him. And he returned fire: Rising Sun Slash!

Two rising white slashes met a falling waterfall of raging ink. Zane's Axes rose, cleaving through it, struggling against that dense tide. But there was an otherworldly power bearing down on them, a power too great to resist. They forced their way halfway up…

But they couldn't hold.

They were blasted aside. The beam shot forth. And Zane's eyes widened.

He tried to dodge.

He couldn't.

***

Neal Elliott saw the shock on the Savage Sage's face. He felt the moment his blast hit the man's body.

It batted him right out of the sky and drilled him straight into the ground. The flames cooked him alive—but it wasn't the fires of the flesh that hurt the most. It was the fires of the soul.

Neal's fires swamped the man. His soul lay defenseless before him, tender, vulnerable… and Neal's demonic fires savaged him. Neal felt a shocking chunk of soul go up in flame—enough to kill a man thrice over. It was shocking—Neal hadn't expected him to have so much. He guessed Zane Walker was a World Ranker for a reason.

Was.

The Savage Sage spasmed and went still. The man's body lay face down, still smoking.

He didn't get back up.

And Neal Elliott let out a shrill laugh. He felt his life force ebbing out of him, felt the aching hole in his soul, the grievous price he'd paid…

But it was worth it.

To the side, one of Kyle's women gasped. "No!" she cried. "Get up, Savage Sage, get up!"

He didn't.

Neal sneered. The man could posture all he liked. But in the end, Neal crushed him like any other gnat. Signed or not, he fell like all the rest.

He only wished Kyle were here to see it. Poor Kyle…

He'd gotten his vengeance, at least.

He watched on, feeling smug, as the Sage's massive body dissolved to essence….

He squinted.

Wait.

That… wasn't essence. That—was that…white flame?!

A deep-throated groan came out of the Savage Sage's charred body. And one massive arm moved, propping him up to an elbow. The skin had all burned off the flesh. But he blinked, and stared up, and frowned.

White flames danced over his skin. New skin thrived in its place.

Neal's mouth hung open.

"But—" he blubbered. "But I hit you! I felt your soul melt!"

"Yeah," rumbled the Savage Sage. "You did hit me. That fucking hurt."

Then he stood. He grinned.

"You're dead! You should be dead thrice over!" croaked Neal. He didn't understand. "You—you've made a pact with a demon too! It lent you its soul!"

Zane blinked, baffled. "…No?"

"Then how?!" Did this Savage Sage have a treasure on him? But Neal would've felt it. No—he was sure he'd struck that man dead in the soul!

He should be in a coma, at least. Losing just half his soul should've done that!

But Zane Walker seemed fine. Wincing a little, but fine. It didn't make sense!

…Unless...

Unless this Savage Sage had so much soul that Neal had only melted a tiny fraction compared to the rest of him.

Just how much soul power was he endowed with?!

"Round two?" said the Savage Sage. He got out his Axes.

Neal screamed. He turned—all several hundred feet of him—and flew as fast as he could, batting his massive wings. He had to make it to the Gorge! If he could dive down there—

Suddenly he was moving very fast, faster than he'd thought possible. It must be his desperation—he tapped into a wellspring of energy he didn't know he had. He felt a wild excitement; he'd make it out!

He glanced down and saw nothing but air.

And he realized it wasn't him that was moving very quickly. It was just his head.

His body was quickly receding behind him into the distance.

He screamed one last time.

And everything went dark.

***

Zane's head pounded.

His body was pretty unhurt. But he still got a warning that he'd dipped under 50% health.

Soul damage, huh.

He still didn't have much clue what to do about it. Tanking it had worked fine-ish for him so far, but when something truly massive struck him—like that black beam—he'd been so hurt he couldn't get up for a good ten or twenty seconds there.

That was death in any other battle.

Neal Elliott's giant demon body dissolved into a whirlpool of white essence. It swirled into him.

𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕡!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟟𝟟->𝟟𝟠

But something else fell out from that body, something that didn't dissolve. A murky orb the same color Neal's eyes had been. It rolled to a halt. Zane inspected it.

𝕆𝕣𝕓 𝕠𝕗 𝔸𝕫𝕖𝕣𝕠𝕥𝕙 𝕀 (ℂ)

𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕤𝕥 𝕋𝕚𝕖𝕣 𝕚𝕟𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕚𝕥𝕒𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕠𝕗 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝔾𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝔻𝕖𝕞𝕠𝕟 𝔸𝕫𝕖𝕣𝕠𝕥𝕙, 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕍𝕠𝕚𝕕 𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕖 𝕊𝕠𝕧𝕖𝕣𝕖𝕚𝕘𝕟, 𝕣𝕦𝕝𝕖𝕣 𝕠𝕗 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕡𝕝𝕒𝕟𝕖𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕓𝕖𝕒𝕣𝕤 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕖𝕞𝕖𝕕 𝕋𝕚𝕥𝕝𝕖. ℙ𝕖𝕖𝕣 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟, 𝕞𝕠𝕣𝕥𝕒𝕝 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕘𝕒𝕚𝕟 𝕡𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣𝕤 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕓𝕚𝕕𝕕𝕖𝕟 𝕥𝕠 𝕞𝕒𝕟!

𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝔽𝕚𝕣𝕤𝕥 𝕋𝕚𝕖𝕣 𝕔𝕠𝕟𝕥𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕤: …

It was pretty much all the Skills he'd seen the Cultists use. Plus a Law tacked on at the end—the Major Law of Ethereal Flames. There was some kind of Law trance in here, Zane gathered. He skimmed down to the end.

𝔹𝕦𝕥 𝕘𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕡𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣𝕤 𝕪𝕖𝕥 𝕒𝕨𝕒𝕚𝕥. 𝔽𝕠𝕣 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕕𝕒𝕣𝕚𝕟𝕘, 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕒𝕞𝕓𝕚𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕦𝕤, 𝕚𝕟 𝕖𝕩𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕒 𝕗𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟 𝕠𝕗 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕤𝕠𝕦𝕝—

Zane stopped reading.

Huh. So this was that 'Inheritance' those stragglers had been talking about—what the whole Cult was based on. Just a bunch of Skills plus a Law package in one. They seemed related to each other too. Quite a windfall. It might be ranked C, but it was really a bunch of C-ranked treasures bundled in one.

Most of these Skills didn't interest Zane so much. They weren't really his style. But there was that healing Skill, Rebirth in Flame. And a soul defense Skill too, 'Hellfire Cloak,' that he could really do with.

Just applying the Law of Fiery Rebirth on its own lightly cleaned up surface-level wounds pretty well. But he'd seen those Fire Mages regrowing Kyle's limbs in real time—could he do that for himself?

He was just one person self-healing… probably not at the rate they were doing it. Even just patching up serious internal wounds in the heat of battle would be really useful. It was like using essence and Law to temporarily mimic the effects of a super-high Regeneration stat. It tickled him.

Then there was the Law hidden within. The Major Law of the Ethereal Flame…

Now that Zane had one fire Major Law, he could vaguely make out the scope of the elemental Law that held it—the Elemental Law of Fire. He wasn't anywhere close to it yet. Maybe… a fifth of the way there? A sixth?

This orb would help him get one step closer.

He breathed out and looked around. He could sit down with this and try to suss out whatever Fire Laws he could. Try to nab some Skills before he hopped into the Gorge…

The sun was close to setting.

Then—

Of course. He blinked and looked around. These people were still in chains. One by one he went through and cut them off, finding himself swamped in that usual ritual of sobbing and thanking, and he realized, slightly depressed, that he'd been right. No dungeon crawling was happening today.

Then came the part he was dreading. The part that was unfortunately necessary, since it was clear these people were in no condition to fend for themselves.

He claimed the Safe Zone and messaged Reina to explain just what kind of mess he'd gotten himself into.

She promised she'd be there for him before sunset.

… She was honestly a saint.