NOVEL NEXT Book 2 - Chapter 29 - Nipples of Destiny
Blood red leaves rained over the neat rows of the vineyard. One hundred kilometers west of Toronto, the Gnomes of the Allen Gardens stirred beneath the soil and poked their eyes above to search for enemies. The Assembly of Statues, comprised of sculptures, flamingos, traitorous Gnomes, and wooden beasts held the farm and its potent Relic fruit.
Tonight though…tonight the Gnomes made their push for new territory. For their Ruler, and their God, Emilio. The Ruler of Sun and Shade.
"Mreow." Emilio commanded to his council while licking his paw.
Marzipan's spat on the ground of their tunnel. Petal's second wide, the squat, broad-shouldered brunette with a vicious chip marring her face, rubbed her pregnant belly before addressing Emilio.
"Aye, I'll report, Lord," she nodded. "The Assembly scouts've been spotted. Right where I said they'd be. Hiding like worms in brush, hopin' we wounldn'ta noticed their hides."
Her glare slid to Petal. "They've brought Carved Bear with 'em. The wooden bastard himself."
Petal nodded gravely, squeezing his jaw as he turned to their Keeper of Secrets. "It's true then? The Gnomes of Niagara has convinced the Assembly to use their strongest forces."
Don Badger, their Keeper of Secrets, sucked his teeth and polished his pistol. He adjusted his purple suit before answering. "It's true alright," he looked towards Emilio. "They're comin' for everything. Every damn thing. Allen Gardens, my outpost I so graciously handed over. The Assembly wants control of the whole province."
Petal swore under his breath and ran a hand through his newly streaked beard. He had changed since the Ritual on the roof. His golden hair now had streaks of red, and his ocean-blue eyes had turned the color of rusted leaves. Even his swim trunks were now a battle-read plaid in place of blue. He'd changed in so many ways and welcomed it all. Emilio, his Lord, had made him so much more powerful, but he wasn't sure if even he could handle that wooden beast.
"Then it's to safety for you," Gravewhistle ordered to Marzipan. "Back with Petunia. No arguments and you'll stay well clear of the battle."
Marizpan squared her shoulders and pulled a bloody mace off her back. "Oh, aye? Ye think I'll sit in a tunnel while ye lot fight for our soil?" she snapped. "I'm round as a barrel, but I'll still split a skull!"
The two began to argue, and Don Badger started wringing his hands together. Marzipan had defeated his outpost, and then mercifully brought him into the Allen Garden Brigade as an advisor. He knew just how intense she could be.
Before the fight could turn to her threatening Petal with her mace, a horn blared from the surface. All their heads snapped upwards, Emilio's included.
The sound came next. The low thumping that multiplied as the tunnel walls trembled. The pounding grew louder and heavier as the whole vineyard above began to quake. The world above shook with the synchronized march of wooden legs, porcelain feet, and stone hands. A deep, grinding roar of a carved wooden bear statue led the charge. The Assembly had arrived.
Emilio turned to his council, addressing Marzipan first. "Mreow. Meow meow!"
Marzipan's looked down at her belly, bloated and round, and sighed. "Aye, I hear ye, Lord," her shoulders slumped. "Safety it is."
Then Emilio turned to Petal, voice raised with a feline trill. "Meow, mew-mew mreooooow."
Petal's eyebrows rose, then the Steward of Sun and Shade grinned. "As you wish, my Lord."
He moved and shoved his hand into a waiting, glowing mushroom. His whole body went rigid as he connected with the Soil Mind. Across the field, hundreds of waiting Gnomes felt Petal sync with the communication network. Information flowed in an instant, orders were passed, and each Gnome knew the plan. If The Assembly wanted a battle, they would give it to them. They would show The Assembly the Allen Garden Gnomes were not to be truffled with.
Pulling his hand free, Petal returned to himself and quickly rushed over to his deflated wife. He placed a single hand on her shoulder and picked up her chipped chin with a finger. Looking into her eyes, he smiled.
"I'd be beside myself if anything happened to you," He saw that was making her angry, which he knew it would, and placed his forehead against her own. "This one's more important than this battle. You heard Emilio. I've got it. I'll do it for you." Then he kissed his wife.
Marzipan kissed his back aggressively and bit his lip hard. "Ye best not come back as a fallen leaf, Petal. Ye got this, aye?"
She jabbed a finger into his chest.
"Aye?" She repeated.
Petal laughed and puffed his chest out. It was their battle tradition that Marzipan refused to skip. "Aye!"
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Without warning, she clamped her fingers on his nipples and twisted for a double purple-nurple. Petal yelped as she slapped him once, twice, thrice for good measure before grabbing him by the chin and kidding him again. When she finally broke away, she pressed her mace into his hands.
"Then let them fear," she growled. "The Eternal Gnome."
Petal roared and turned toward the tunnel to meet the other soldiers. Behind them both, Emilio and Don Badger shared a look about how weird the Gnomes could be. When Petal was gone, Marzipan turned to Emilio and glowered.
"Ye better not let him die. That ritual better work all the way," then she remembered who she was talking to. "Sir."
Emilio watched her fierceness. Inside, he was thinking. Prior to the Ritual, he hadn't been sure. It had been a chance, a unique Trial offered by the System to propel his followers forward. He'd taken the chance of course. He was a cat. It was dangerous, and could have ended in disaster, both for his friend Petal and his following. But the System had rewarded him again. So, he blinked at her and answered.
"Mreow." He said with certainty. Of course it would work. Marzipan nodded severely and retreated to safety to join her other love, Petunia. Don Badger went to ensure the Gnomes had their armaments in order.
Emilio loafed onto the soil and sent his awareness to the sky to watch the battle. He would only intervene if things were dire. The System had made it very clear the Gnomes had to win the battle themselves in his Trial Notification.
Two thousand porcelain hands raised their bows. At Petal's command through the Soil Mind, the Allen Garden archers loosed. The sky clouded under a storm of arrows, some carved from needles, some grown from thorn, and some dripping with poison and Curses and Pain Skills. Arrows bounced off concrete torsos or shattered against marble. A few shots drove straight into the hearts of wooden Monsters. A frog statue took an arrow to the knee and toppled. Lawn Flamingos screeched, their claws carving into the dirt. The wooden soldiers howled as arrows found purchase.
When the final echo faded, the soil stirred. From hundreds of small, round holes across the vineyard, the Gnomes of Allen Gardens rose as one. And standing at the front was Petal Gravewhistle with a flapping beard streaked with red.
Petal planted his feet as the Gnomes rallied behind him to face The Assembly. Hundreds of Monsters were led by a giant bear. Ten feet of polished hardwood, with scythes for claws, and a carved mouth of hunger, Carved Bear loomed and towered, but Petal Gravewhistle did not flinch under any shadow. For the shadows belonged to the Gnomes too.
"Never again!" Petal thundered, as the falling leaves stilled in the air. "Never again shall Gnomes bow! To concrete, to flamingo, to people, or to cursed, splintered wood! We are the keepers of ground, the sons and daughters of soil and seed!"
He pointed his weapon toward the Bear as the autumn leaves began to churn around him. "It is from soil we rise, from sun and shade we thrive. And by the roots of our home, all who stand above us shall fall beneath us!"
The Gnomes screamed bloody murder and funneled around Petal to attack The Assembly. Still, he stood and faced Carved Bear alone.
Then Carved Bear roared Rot magic from its mouth, dropped on all fours, and charged Petal.
Blood-red leaves swirled into a cyclone around the Steward. It was a new Skill from the Ritual called [Fallen Leaves]. He imbued each one, and they spun faster and faster until the storm became a weapon. It was an orbit of blades made of autumn controlled by his intent. Petal threw his arms wide and bellowed at the charging Monster. His eyes leaked dew as his new power surged. The strength of a hundred, no, thousands of leaves poured into him. It was the will of sun and shade answering to their Steward's call.
Earth split and melted away to pestilence beneath Carved Bear's wake. It offended Petal. To have one's abilities be one of only rot, with nothing in the way of life.
"An abomination."
He kicked off the soil with explosive force, launching like seed thrown by a god. A thousand razor leaves followed and spiralled around him. He met the Bear mid-charge, his wife's mace gripped tight. Just as Carved Bear throws a scythed claw out, he stretched his body and dodged the attack by a leaf's width.
Right in place, Petal swung, and the forest itself around him howled with him.
CRACK
The mace crunched through Carved Bear's shoulder, shattering through years of hardened wood. A thousand leaves followed to slice and splinter across Petal's enemy. He landed hard and scrambled to his feet, but the Monster was faster than he'd thought. Despite its bulk, Carved Bear turned quickly. Its chest expanded and creaked before it unleashed a roar.
A torrent of Rot Magic flew out of its maw. It was an acidic storm of decay and corruption that turned life to ash.
Petal screamed as the wave hit him. His porcelain skin melted and ran like wax, and he felt his body dissolving under the caustic flood. He could feel himself unmaking. But he did not move. Emilio had told him to trust Gaia. To trust in the Ritual of Nine Lives. So instead of falling, he roared into the ruin and called his other new Skill, [Unrelenting Life]. It let him take from the Earth so he could give back later.
The cyclone of leaves changed course. They tightened, then dove to fly toward him. Rather than wrap around him for defence, they buried into him, one after another, embedding in the porcelain and sinking into his chest and limbs. The pain was excruciating. Every leave was its own torment. But Gaia was listening and answered his endurance.
And then Petal Gravewhistle laughed. It drowned out the clashes and the bear's howl. The torrent of Rot Magic of Carved Bear, legendary and feared, faltered, then stopped.
When the smoke cleared, Petal Gravewhistle stood in the center of a circle of melted earth. The mace was gone, melted to nothing. But his body was unmarred, and he puffed out his chest and famously large nipples. His beard hadn't grown, but it had changed. There were more streaks red within it.
Every single skirmish of Gnomes against The Assembly stopped to look at Petal.
"That's all you got?" He laughed. "From rot comes bloom, from death comes seed. From your fall, Bear, our roots will feed!"
The Gnomes roared together and charged their enemies. Petal Gravewhistle floated up on a torrent of leaves and prepared his next attack.
And below, Emilio loafed with his beans tucked, purred, and watched from the sky. The System had been right again. There was such potential in all members of his pack. He did notice something, though.
That crouching figure on the outskirt of battle? The one that smelled of pestilence and clumped, unmaintained fur? He saw the cat that was not a cat lurking and waiting. So be it, he decided. The runt would come when the runt would come. Emilio always loved teaching other cat's a lesson.