The Siege of Bolrif - Part 5

Oliver's army had retreated in the same night after the attack. It had barely taken them an hour to flatten the whole village. He'd even brought cavalry with him – an even more insane task than moving mere people through the mountains. With a mounted squadron of a hundred mounts, capable of moving through the snow, he had all he needed to ensure that there were no survivors.

They'd achieved their purpose of flattening the town – which had been a major foothold in the raiding trade, with its river in the summer having a good connection to the sea – and now they withdrew.

The crows had all the food that they wished to eat. They could sample whatever flesh they found to be their favourite. The old flesh of a leathery old woman, killed with a single swift slash across the back, or the tough muscular flesh of a warrior, who had stood in the town's defence, only to be flattened before Oliver's might.

The crows were intelligent beasts. They allowed themselves such indulgences. After a string of meat from a bearded man, the beady-eyed crow craved something more.

There, near the gates – that mangled body, more wounded than the rest, punctured through at several points, yet still youthful. That was a rare recipe, different to the rest. It flew over, curious, perching atop the head, lining up its beak with pale blue dead eyes, it prepared to take one for itself.

!! WISH ACKNOWLEDGED. SYSTEM BOOTING. INITATING ONE TIME BLESSING: FULL RESTORE.

ASSESSING DAMAGE… BEYOND FATAL… BEGINNING HEALING PROCESS… 3… 2… 1…

BROKEN BONES, REGENERATED

ORGANS, REGENERATED

MUSCLES, REGENERATED

REMAINING INJURED TISSUE… REGENERATED

With a gasping breath, like a swimmer surfacing from the bottom of a deep lake, Vol drew air into his lungs, and reached out with a hand, grasping the crow between his fingers, mid-strike, just barely saving his eye.

With a slight flexing of his fingers, he shattered its ribs, neck, and spine. It gave a startled squeak. He tossed the body over his shoulder, and arose slowly to his feet, carefully, like a man who had just spent the night in impossible dreams.

He took in the destruction. He saw the corpses. He saw the smouldering buildings.

And – he heard a voice in his head, before seeing what it had proclaimed.

!! MAIN QUEST DELIVERED: SLAY THE STORMFRONT GENERAL OLIVER PATRICK

A man that had not flinched from a blade in battle, and yet he found himself jumping back at those words, looking around, searching for an assailant, and searching for his axe at the same time.

!! PHYSICAL STATE ACKNOWLEDGED: NERVOUS

Again the voice came, and again Vol jumped back, his foot sweeping across the snow. Even if he had to make do with one of the Stormfront's cowardly long spears, he would have taken it. But he saw none of them, only discarded axes, covered in blood, half frozen to the ground. It would take a great effort to pry any of them up, but he eyed one of them anyway, in the absence of his own.

He caught movement again at the corner of his eye. Every time he'd heard that voice, he'd seen movement accompany it, but every time he turned, there was nothing there. His heart was pounding, and his eyes were wide and searching, but he forced himself to take a calm breath, as he stood his ground, and tracked the movement, focusing on what he could see out of the corner of his eye.

As he focused on it, it shifted. He had to physically fight the urge to reach down and grabbed the bloodied axe at his feet as he noted the change, but now that it was larger in his vision, he was almost completely sure that it was not a human, nor a sword coming for his head.

!! SYSTEM REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED: SYSTEM OVERVIEW DISPLAYED

And there before him, his eyes blackened, and the whole world changed. Boxes of silver lines, with a half-transparent backdrop of black, it was as though he was looking through the bottom of a bottle, and it was distorting his worldview.

In fact, he was half sure that was exactly what it was – it was one of those bits of stained glass that the raiders had brought back with them, a shattered piece held over his eye. His heart pounded, it took a great effort to still it. He was half sure that he was going mad – that was the foremost possibility in his mind, now that he'd dismissed the possibility of a sword coming for him.

"Who are you?" He asked aloud, finally addressing the voice. The voice had spoken strange things, of systems, of physical states – the sort of well-spoken defining terms that a boy who could not read or write would never hear.

!! SYSTEM REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED: EXPLANATION. EXPLANATION FOUND. I AM CAPABLE OF EXPLAINING OPTION 'WHO AM I', WOULD YOU LIKE TO PROCEED?

Half of these words were words that Vol didn't know. He was not well spoken, he was not educated – and yet the meaning of the words, they seered directly into his brain, as though they'd been whispered there, absent the constraints of sound.

It was not only sound that accompanied the voice now, but he was sure he could also see what was being said. In a row of glyphs, extending in front of him, he saw the text being written. He recognized these glyphs. They were the sort of glyphs he'd seen carved on expensive weapons, or on the storefront signs of wealthy establishments. They were the glyphs of his people – but he'd never been able to read them before. He'd never even tried to learn how.

But now, as he read, once again, the same meaning popped into his head, as easily as if he'd been reading his whole life.

"Yes…" he breathed, carefully, swimming in this sea of strangeness, amidst the corpses of all that had grown up with him.

!! SYSTEM EXPLANATION: CONDITIONS HAVE BEEN MET. YOU, VOL, BROTHER OF JOK, HAVE BEEN CHOSEN. YOUR WISH HAS BEEN HEARD. THE SYSTEM EXISTS FOR PURPOSE: SLAYING OLIVER PATRICK. THE SYSTEM WILL GUIDE YOU TOWARDS STRENGTH. HAS UNDERSTANDING BEEN ACHIEVED?