The Road Not Taken III

Having Brunhilde under his thumb was more worth it than spending his winning lottery ticket for a $3,200 root canal to fix a three-year long relationship with a cavity-decayed lower molar. The information she could provide in the inner workings of pantheons alone was enough to waste a few hundred credits on making her life easier.

Irwin wasn't bluffing when he said that Brunhilde had been getting messages from pantheons. In fact, one of the very first voicemails she had received from Brunhilde was about informing him about the arrival of one of Odin's ravens.

At the time, It had seemed that even the pagan gods of the Old World were taking measures to survive the reckoning of the Ultimate Battle. Irwin guessed that it was why so many pagans—mostly from European folklore–were in North America; trying to either bide their time to participate in the war or hide within plain sight.

He also guessed that hunters and civilians around the continent would be dying more thanks to the increased number of paganistic monsters, which was why he was adamant to enact his Protectorate plan after dealing with the Mesopotamians.

The latter of whom have him surrounded in an aggressive position yet still kept their distance from him and elevator. Marduk had been stayed by Irwin's words, preferring to stay silent as opposed to butt heads with the latter.

"So," Irwin snapped his fingers to test their attentions, causing all but one to focus on his fingertips. "Should I state my terms, or should I detonate that bomb?"

"State your terms." Marduk nodded his head, eliciting visceral reactions from the sister.

"You disgrace yourself." Ninsar barked. "Conspiring with a human, a witch no less, against our kin. She killed our sisters!"

"Oh, please!" Marduk's wife spat at Ninsar. "You are destined to die, lesser one. You know nothing of the grief caused by the Otherworlders, for you are born of retribution, of greedy anger."

"How dare you!" Ninsar looked ready to take out Marduk's wife, but Mamu stepped in before it came to blows.

Mamu glared at Irwin. "He is a viper, Marduk. His deal is honeyed words over a pile of venomous dung. Acknowledging him as our equal is a mistake, one that the Great Matron would scarcely forget."

"Threats only hold meaning when there is substance behind it, little one." Marduk shook his head. "State your terms, witch, but know that Marduk's wrath knows no relent. My love."

Marduk's wife nodded as her eyes glowed white. A bubble of air erupted out of her open mouth that grew in size, reaching half the size of the chamber and encompassing all unrestrained individuals in mere seconds.

The massive bubble wobbled softly, yet kept its integrity even when pressed up against the rougher edges of the chamber.

"I will not participate in this sham." Ninsar growled away Sarpanit's look. 

Mamu took out her crystal ball. "But given that we are in need of you and your husband's help, we will ask of you to rescind your invitation for an assembly."

"And if not?" Marduk asked with a glowering countenance.

Mamu looked at her sister as their eyes glowed with a familiar light. Irwin removed the Angel Blade out of his spatial bangle, letting the back of the blade slide across his wrists.

"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood," Irwin murmured as he sat down the granite throne and rested his head.

Ninsar pushed forward in an apparent attack towards Irwin, but before she could cross the threshold, a figure blocked her way. What had once been a silent companion to the husband and wife, the gangly, hunchbacked man smashed into Ninsar and forced her into her throne.

"Sirrush." Upon Marduk's call, the man's body began to contort and transform into a hideous creature. His back arched into normal as scales crawled out of his skin, his legs slowly morphed into that of a buff eagle's legs with razor-sharp talons scraping forward as it grew.

His hands bled out as brown fur replaced his hirsute skin while his hands turned into paws. Irwin would have likened him to a lion and giraffe hybrid, especially with his long tail and elongated neck, but disregarded that thought once the man grew two curved horns upon his forehead.

The transformation lasted no more than two seconds, enough for Mamu to cast their spell and for Marduk to disrupt it with a well-timed slap to their crystal ball.

"What are you doing, Marduk?" Mamu asked indignantly.

Marduk scoffed, "Surviving." He kicked Mamu in the chest, sending the pagan god into their smooth granite throne. "Sirrush. Kill the butcher!"

The lion-mutant-hybrid rushed towards Ninsar, using every bit of his body to inhibit the pagan goddess from utilizing the tools at her disposal. Irwin was impressed by how flexible the monster was and also a bit relieved that he didn't need to fight them.

Sure, he would eke out a victory in the end, but he was already lightly injured and too tired to fight.

'Maybe I'm just getting lazy.' He nodded at his thoughts before hearing a warped thud behind him. The bony pillar monsters were trying to get inside of the bubble yet, even with assault after assault, the best they could do was make the bubble wobble and hit them back with the recoil.

"Wow. This bubble's good." He complimented Marduk's wife.

"I know. You may call me Sarpanit." Sarpanit gave a gracious yet condescending smile. "It is best if we let my husband and his pet finish the fight before we converse."

"Of course." Irwin went back to watching the fight, twirling the Angel Sword around like a bored housewife.

Marduk clearly knew what Mamu was capable of, keeping them from casting their spells and making sure not to be too far away from their position. When Mamu tried to go for their crystal ball, Marduk was there to kick it away and continually played off Mamu's best melee attacks.

Still, Mamu was not a god for naught for, even at the disadvantage of defending against a better fighter, they succeeded in casting a spell. It wasn't a spell, technically, merely an extension of her divine ability, but, to Irwin's system, it was considered a spell or hex.

Their mouth barked out a puff of golden vapor that latched onto Marduk's face. Once the vapor touched the god's skin, it popped and sizzled away the very flesh. As if some kind of symbiotic acid, the golden hue latched onto the wounds created by the acid and began to eat its way inside of Marduk's head.

"Should we…?" Irwin asked Sarpanit hesitantly, a frown marring his face.

"Patience, young one." Sarpanit's tone told Irwin that she was just about done with his questions.

Marduk roared defiantly, causing the bubble to wobble some more and the other three combatants to halt in their tracks. Golden blood dripped out of Marduk's face–looking as if it was housing a hornet's nest–as black lines appeared on his exposed skin.

Irwin had seen one such occurrence before, having worked as a hospital staff once, with a snake-bite victim who had been bitten by seven snakes in five different spots in her body.

Green smoke began to billow out of Marduk's body, quickly filling his side of the bubble of an acrid gas. Before it could surround the whole bubble, however, Sarpanit snapped her fingers and opened up a small hole for the gas to go through.

'Looks like they've done this before,' Irwin thought as he noticed the sheer complacency within Sarpanit's expression, as if she wasn't the least bit worried about her husband. 'I mean, I wouldn't be too if I could do that.'

Marduk barreled towards Mamu just as they were about to reach for their crystal ball, kicking them in the gut and sending them rolling towards the other end of the bubble.

Mamu wiped the blood off their face and slapped it into the ground, which emitted a bright crimson light, momentarily blinding Marduk. Unfortunately for them, Marduk was an unstoppable creature, even when the light transformed into a crimson vine that entangled his legs.

He grabbed Mamu by their head and planted his mouth on them. Irwin was more than confused, as evident by the swivel of his head towards Sarpanit.

"I, uh…" Before he could continue, the streaks of green lines across Marduk's body, as well as the golden wounds on his face, smoothly flowed towards his mouth and into Mamu's face.

Mamu tried to resist the kiss, using every bit of magik in their repertoire, but Marduk's grip was that of a starving viper capturing their prey. Soon, Mamu's normally dark skin had turned into a hideous crater of pus and boils that contained green poison and black death.

Marduk halted his kiss and let Mamu drop to the ground, which caused the boils in her arm to pop and splash puss all over the ground.

Irwin was expecting Ninsar to shout for her sister's safety, but he found her bloodied and beaten to the ground with her left arm chewed to the bone. Next to her was Sirrush, who had been chopped to seven different pieces, albeit still alive as evident by his wagging tail and mournful howls.

"Boy, you guys do things quickly," Irwin joked, but was quick to take back his delight when Marduk raised his leg to stomp upon Mamu's bloating head. "Hey, could you not kill them, Marduk?" 

"You will address him as King Marduk." Sarpanit glides out of her chair and into the arms of King Marduk. "But I think we can do that, can't we, my love?"

Marduk grinned, a pockmarked face full of sizzling acid. "We do."