Ruthless: Path of Conquest

James and his war party reached another tree that he sensed was occupied. This time, there were more than two dozen creatures huddled together.

We’re probably going to have to abandon stealth, he assessed.

“Another volley like the last one,” he ordered. “Everyone with firearms, be ready to pick off any creatures that try to fly away. With this many, they’re not likely to all fall with the first wave of attacks. The noise doesn’t matter as much as not letting any get away.”

“Yes, sir.” A chorus of hushed voices from behind him.

The more they do this, the better they’re getting at it, he thought. Are they weirdly good at killing things, or are these just the types of people who have survived Orientation? Humans are predators, after all.

He smiled. These are my people. A fierce people, we former Americans. With them, I could build an empire.

He waited for his comrades to charge their attacks, and then he thrust his arm forward in an overhead chop.

Another wave of attacks launched at his command. The power and fury of it was exhilarating.

Imagine if I had a whole army…

He could picture wave upon wave of magical and physical projectiles tearing through monsters, buildings, natural obstacles—anything that might get in his way. And then he thought of the vision Sister Strange had shown him of his future kingdom being overtaken. He had to push that out of his mind to keep from shuddering.

The barrage was highly effective. As James had predicted, a few of the bats managed to survive with little or no damage, but the soldiers in his ranks armed with rifles aimed a concentrated burst of gunfire at them. It was loud, but the previously unharmed bats were dead before they struck the ground. The echoes lasted a little longer.

Well, the element of surprise is broken, but the fact that the last tree burned down would have broken it if the Ruler were like me. Maybe the bat boss just isn’t paying much attention.

Then James and his soldiers—especially the Goblins, who seemed to get really into this part—walked around putting the wounded creatures out of their misery. Roscuro absorbed two more souls, and the soldiers let out a cheer as the tree burned, before they moved on.

I guess I won’t get the, um, credit if I pull off a Xenocide here, James thought as he marched his troops to the next occupied tree. I’m not killing off the monsters singlehandedly, although everyone doing damage to these things is acting under my command. Oh well. I probably couldn’t do this by myself. There are too many of them, and they can fly.

As they reached the next tree, James raised a fist to signal his soldiers to stop. He heard a sound, almost at the edge of his awareness. Subtle, almost silent, wings moving through the air.

Only almost silent. Nothing in the natural universe could truly move silently. And that seemed to hold true even in the post-System world.

So James could hear the creature approaching them. From the sound of the wings, he thought it was large. A bigger, stronger version of these monstrous bats, maybe.

Probably the Ruler.

“What’s up?” asked Dave, who had positioned himself at James’s right flank.

“Something big is approaching,” James said quietly but distinctly. “Everyone needs to be prepared for a dramatic increase in the amount of resistance we’ve been dealing with.”

Since the invasion thus far had been a one-sided slaughter, any resistance would be a dramatic increase compared with what they had experienced. But as James glanced back at the faces of his comrades, he saw that they seemed to understand what he meant.

He reminded himself, All of these people survived Orientations too. They’ve all seen things I wouldn’t be able to guess. It’s not only me. Some of them are also hardened.

The wing beats abruptly turned and navigated away from James’s position.

“What the hell?” James said under his breath. “Where is it going now?”

He couldn’t precisely track the position of the apparent Ruler with just sound, but this was definitely a move away from him and his troops.

Is it just running away? Abandoning the others of its kind to escape with its life?

He shook his head. It was hard to believe any creature that had risen to become a Ruler would be so cowardly when it hadn’t even seen James and his forces yet. Even if the creature had superhuman senses beyond James’s, the tree canopy hid them from direct view.

And even James needed to be close to determine, from sound alone, how many enemies he was facing.

“What should we do?” Dave asked. “Do you want to retreat?”

James shook his head. “No. We haven’t even seen the main enemy yet. I won’t leave until we at least have some idea of what we’re facing.”

Actually, this bears telling everyone. Command Presence and their own experiences have made them a more cohesive fighting force than they would be otherwise, but there’s only so much I can expect out of untrained soldiers. Hardly any of these people are veterans of real wars like Dave. Even if they were, getting up close and fighting within inches of your enemy isn’t the same as shooting someone from a distance. If there’s a counter attack, that’s what we’ll be facing.

He turned to face the rest of the group. “Everyone, we’re about to face a stronger enemy,” he said, projecting so that everyone could hear him. “All of you who accompanied me here came voluntarily, and I appreciate that. Your efforts have obviously been very successful so far, and you have my gratitude. You have shown that we’re a country to be taken seriously!”

A little whoop went up from the crowd.

James’s eyes narrowed, and he raised his voice. “But now, I have to remind you that you are all here voluntarily. After this next enemy arrives, that changes. If there is anyone who wants to run away before the boss monster gets here, I won’t stop them. You will not be punished in any way. I just—I can’t have anyone breaking and running once the main enemy is actually here. That kind of display of weakness could cause the enemy to underestimate us, it could spook others into running, and the end result is that you could end up getting everyone else killed. At the very least, you should expect it to cost some lives. And I know that for all of us, getting one of our friends, one of our neighbors, killed would be one person too many. Our community is small, and every life is valuable.” He looked from person to person. “If there’s anyone here who thinks there’s a chance they might run away at the critical moment, please excuse yourself now.”

Then he pointedly turned his back on the soldiers.

He could hear people whispering behind him, but he very deliberately ignored them and tried to selectively listen to the distant sounds of flight.

The big monster was moving again, and the situation was worse than he’d imagined. The creature was approaching them quickly, but apparently it had stopped for a good reason. Now it was no longer flying alone. A difficult to estimate number of wings flapped and glided alongside the lead monster.

A hand clapped on James’s shoulder, and he had to use all his superhuman reserve of self control not to jump at the touch. Instead, he simply turned his head and saw Dave was back at his side again.

“Everyone agrees,” Dave said loudly. “No one is leaving your side.”

Well, I hope you’re right, James thought. And I hope that’s not a terrible mistake on their part…

The cheer went up from those who had followed him once again.

“James! James! James!”

And he allowed himself to bask in the glow for a moment.

At least if I die here, it’s kind of an awesome way to go out.

Mina’s face, James Junior’s face, Yulia’s face, his Mom’s face, Alice’s face, and even Abhi’s face all came to mind suddenly. The idea of a beautiful death in battle alongside his soldiers was instantly spoiled.

Can’t die here, or what happens to them? His mind returned to Sister Strange’s visions. Maybe that’s how Mina dies alone. I’m dead already. Although that would require that the vision where I’m getting my ass kicked can’t happen. Maybe I can’t die yet. At least if there’s anything to that creature’s visions...

He swallowed and put on a smile that did not reflect his feelings.

I’ll just have to kill beautifully instead.

Just then James heard a sound of racing footsteps coming from behind him—coming from the direction of the Fisher Kingdom. It made no sense to him. Who would follow us?

Then he saw them. Like the eagles soaring to the rescue in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, the creatures that were perhaps his most loyal followers would not miss this opportunity to come to his rescue.

We heard that you went into battle, my king, came Luna’s voice inside his head. But you forgot to invite us!

I didn’t forget, James wanted to say. I just don’t know what you guys are supposed to do against a bunch of flying bats! I didn’t want to get you killed…

But he didn’t respond with that. It would undermine the confidence of his allies to suggest he didn’t think they could help.

Thank you for coming, he sent. We’re about to face the main enemy now. You’ve come just in time!

And the soldiers who had been cheering for James chanted, “Wolves! Wolves! Wolves!”

Well, maybe we’ll all die together, James thought quietly. Won’t that be nice.

There was one actually useful piece of help that the wolves’ arrival brought. Not to be left out, Duncan had joined them, riding into battle atop Luna’s mate, Romulus. His illusions might be useful, if this became a small-scale war.

“Good to see you’re still in good health, Your Majesty,” Duncan said as Romulus pulled alongside James. “And I’m very pleased to see a number of brave Goblin fighters accompanied you and your army into this fight.”

James nodded. “They’ve represented your people well,” he said. “I’m pleased to be able to count on the loyal support of so many brave soldiers. I was especially impressed that they volunteered. I did not order them.”

Duncan looked proud and gave his Goblins a salute, which they returned, drawing themselves up to their full unimpressive heights.

Then James ordered his forces into a defensive formation. The fast-moving wolves were to stand at the edges of the mostly human ranged fighting force, ready to sprint or leap at any enemies that touched ground or drew near it. James kept Duncan near himself at the front of the human-Goblin contingent of forces, ready to use his illusions if ordered and close enough for James to easily defend him.

But he ordered all of them to remain peaceful until ordered otherwise, unless first attacked by the enemy.

The combined force stood there waiting in formation for a total of less than thirty seconds, but James imagined they must have made a formidable picture.

The tropical forest ecosystem the bats lived in was relatively densely populated with trees, so that the sunlight that came through the canopy was patchy and inconsistent.

The result of that was that when the enemy arrived, the bats’ wings almost completely blotted out the sun.

James didn’t even allow his expression to change. He maintained his smile. He kept his cool. He let the soldiers see that he wasn’t shaken.

As the enemy colony began to land several feet away from him, James counted their numbers.

Around a hundred bats, he estimated. And—wait, what the hell are those?

Accompanying the bats were a roughly equal number of gliding, rodent-like creatures. But their faces and body types were distinctly different from the bats’. Whereas the bats looked like they wore grotesque Halloween masks made by a master special effects artist, these other things just looked like giant rats with wings. The flying squirrels and bats were of similar stature, each a bit taller than an average human.

Not quite wings. What are those things between their limbs?

He used Identify on the two lead creatures from the respective species, which had landed at the heads of their respective forces and which ominously both gave off the feeling of being Rulers.

Red Flying Squirrel Queen Ysabel, Lv. 33

These are squirrels?! Really?

They were by far the creepiest looking squirrels James had ever seen.

Black Bloodsucking Bat Queen Barbara, Lv. 35

Crap. They really are two Rulers. I would assume that I could take either of them out alone, but together…

A hideous shrieking suddenly filled his ears. James had to exercise some restraint to keep his hands at his sides instead of covering them.

Gradually, it became apparent that the shrieking was actually words. The voice seemed to be speaking English—or at least the shrieks from the Black Bloodsucking Bat Queen were translated into English rather than some other language. James still wasn’t quite clear on how human the monsters he kept encountering were, and how the System-assisted translations worked.

Queen Barbara was saying, “How dare you pipsqueaks invade my family’s home?”