Source & Soul: A Deckbuilding LitRPG

The demon with the tail greeted Hull with a great deal more familiarity than I would have expected. I hadn't seen her since Hull's mother had tried escaping out of the Nether rift with the King's card, and she looked considerably more sure of herself today. Before, she had been like a taut bow string, full of purpose but rigid to the point of breaking when facing down Yveda and then Felstrife, too.

Now, the horned demon stood with the inborn confidence of a ruler, lips pulled back in a smile that revealed sharp teeth, garnet flecked eyes luminous, like a zealous crowd that a Tender had whipped into a fury. I gave the throne room a quick scan, searching out what buoyed her faith, for she had not a single card summoned, and should have quailed – or at least retreated – from the small army we had brought to bear: Esmi's Ice Wyrm hung to the side of the palace, its desiccated tail thick enough to serve as a ramp for Esmi and me to enter the throne room. One of my Master Shieldbearers led the way and Emerus brought up the rear, while Hull's Yveda the Endless swarmed into the room like roaches.

We were flush with Source and summons, and the bowl with the King's card sat on the seat of the throne not twenty paces away. There was no way a lone demon could stop us, Epic souled or not – but if she perceived the threat we represented, she didn't show it. Is she half-mad? I wondered. Or does she know something that we do not?

No sooner had the thought came to me than a presence filled the room. It had the same cloying thickness as a cell that's held too many men for too long, but this was a sharp, biting thing that burned the breath in my nose and hung on the back of my neck like a plow horse's collar. I saw Morgane shudder and cough, and Warrick squeaked with rodent-like fear, scurrying into a corner behind some white marble columns that held the ceiling aloft.

The disturbing weight only intensified as an overlarge demon filled the doorway to the antechamber connected to the throne room. Before meeting Hull's newly elevated Night Terror, I would have called this purple-skinned beast huge, standing at least fifteen feet tall, probably near twenty if his twisted horns were added to the count. He said something about being the "Primarch," but I was more interested in the lack of Source hovering over his head and the absence of cards in his clawed hands or hovering nearby.

On bent-back legs, he stepped into the throne room proper, unfurling wings that were batlike and twice as wide as he was tall. His bare chest rippled with muscle, and every edge of him was sharpened to a killing point, from his teeth to his claws to his slivered eyes. He was a predator if there ever was one, but without cards, I found little to fear.

"Esmi," I said over my shoulder, without letting our enemies out of my sight, "please distract him with some of your Skeletons."

My fiancée had always felt more comfortable when surrounded by a swarm, and so, using Emerus's ability to feed her Common cards, she had stuffed a garrison's worth of the basic Undead Souls in the Wyrm's hollow ribcage. They weren't particularly fast, but they had since crawled their way free and were grouping up behind her.

"That's a good idea," she said. Her voice was tight from the demon's miasma, but she joined me nonetheless. Her Undead force moved with her, arcing around us with jerky footsteps and heading toward the demon.

I doubted the 1/1s would be able to overcome someone who styled himself a primarch, but we didn't need to defeat our enemies, just stall them.

Morgane was still hacking, but he had set up a Barracks at the edge of the missing wall to the throne room and Soldiers were starting to exit the Structure, along with a Sergeant to strengthen them – a tried and true Order strategy.

The thump of flesh on flesh turned my head to see Hull and the demon girl trading punches, while the smaller, summoned version of Hull danced around, inserting blows when he could.

She didn't seem to be taking as much damage from the hits as she should have, only a card or two floating off of her at a time.

"You've grown stronger," she declared with fierce delight, which only seemed to make Hull redouble his efforts. Demons truly were a different breed.

I turned to Esmi, trusting in the Souls of my comrades for a brief moment. "It is only a matter of time until reinforcements arrive from the rest of the palace, and you are better equipped to hold them at bay than I am." She nodded in understanding and then we shared the briefest of kisses, her lips warm on mine, before I was off, dashing across the throne room, my Master Shieldbearer at my side.

"Hull, the page!" I shouted at him when I was near enough. He had the rolled parchment through one beltloop, and the bomb taken from Warrick tucked into the other. He pivoted, ripping the paper free and tossing it my way, but the move cost him, leaving a blind spot open for the demon's tail to wrap around his leg, tripping him.

The page didn't end up much farther away from where he landed, but I managed to snatch it up, knowing he'd understand why I wasn't stopping to help him. His younger self was already doing that work for me.

On my way to the throne itself, a glance to the side showed me the large demon surrounded by Skeletons and Yvedas. As I had expected, the Primarch was tearing through the Common cards, and the Mythic ones too. More disturbing, he wasn't simply breaking the summoned Souls into shards, but eating them, much like my Carrion Condors enjoyed doing.

"I will devour your Soul, Endless!" the Primarch cackled as he dined, and just as my birds grew stronger in their feasting, I saw a nimbus of gray energy building up around him. I doubted that could be anything good for us, but he was being kept busy and that was what mattered most.

I came to a stop in front of the bowl, breathing hard from my impromptu sprint. There it was: the King's card, floating serenely in the alchemical mix that had helped me destroy Felstrife.

It was surreal to see after meeting the man himself – or whatever it was that remained of him – in Afi's Mind Home. He had said that his card couldn't be destroyed in this manner, and as best as I could judge, he was correct: his Soul card showed no signs of damage or corrosion.

I hefted the page, wondering not for the first time what significance it represented. Was it simply that it had been the King's or did it hold some deeper meaning? The bold strokes of the writing were more brown than was common for ink. Perhaps the color simply reflected its age, or perhaps it wasn't ink at all. His blood, maybe?

Knowing I would get no answers, I did as the King had directed, dropping the page into the mix. The parchment dissolved on contact, the acid bath eating into it with a vengeance, as if to make up for the fact that it couldn't destroy the man himself.

As this happened, I spoke clearly, "Hymane, come forth," and after a moment's pause, I added, "Dallon, come forth." The second was a gamble, but one Esmi had agreed with me on the flight over was worth it.

The mixture bubbled and from the King's card, a second grew, green-bordered and beautiful, like a fresh stalk in my mother's garden.

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It stuck just enough out of the acid for me to grab, though I still shed some shards from touching the residue of the solution. And then came the second, diamond-edged, making my breath catch in my chest.

I lost another two cards reaching for it, but I would have burned through half my deck to have the Legendary in my possession.

"My great-grandfather trained under him," the Master Shieldbearer beside me said, all the while keeping her head on a swivel. "Always dreamed I'd match him some day."

Holding such treasures made my blood race, but my hands were steady as I pulled two cards from my Mind Home and slotted both in. Now I just needed to –

"Why has the device not been activated?!" The Queen's voice rang out through the room, creating a brief lull in the fighting.

My eyes snapped onto the very bomb she was referring to. Of course, she had said she could speak through Artifacts she'd had a hand in making. That didn't mean she could hear back though, did it?

"What in Fortune's great hairy balls…" Hull grumbled, reaching for the sphere. The demon girl collided with him, knocking the ball from his gauntleted hand.

It hit the marble floor with a ping and then moved at speed, quick as the greased piglets I saw common folk chase at festival-time. I wouldn't have minded if it rolled right out of the open-air wall of the throne room, and it seemed to be headed that way. But then Warrick appeared from nowhere, scooping it up. No sooner was the sphere in his hands then he started twisting and turning, using whatever secret set of movements the Queen had taught him to activate its destructive force.

Esmi and Morgane were focused on keeping back the living demons who had inevitably been drawn to the sounds of battle, and neither of them were closer to Warrick than I was.

"Warrick!" I shouted, dashing after him. "You'll kill us all!"

"You'll kill the whole city!" he shot back.

He had no Flying Souls or giants at his command to use to escape, so when he reached the open-air expanse, he cut to the right, back toward the safety of the pillars. I had guessed he'd do as much and had already angled that way. I caught him just as he looked about to jam his thumb into the sphere; I grabbed his wrist, pulling it back from the artifact while at the same time putting my forearm on his chest, pushing him up against the nearby pillar.

"Stop," I told him, and when he kept fighting me, I slid my arm up to his throat. "Stop."

"This is my task, mine," he said, squirming against me. "You won't stop me at it, you –" He had been staring hate at me but then his eyes darted to the side, hearing something I hadn't. In a move so unexpected I couldn't have planned for it, he dropped the sphere, using that now free hand to shove me back. I stumbled away a good three steps and watched the metal ball bounce away, over the edge, and out of the room. At the same time, I felt something move beside me and heard a soft groan, like an old man bending an overused knee.

I turned to find the Primarch in our midst, the power that had been wisping off of him considerably less than it had been before.

Had he used some of it to fuel a burst of speed? Was that his Soul ability?

And there, at the demon's feet, was Warrick. My old friend had been cut clean through from hip to hip, his two halves pumping blood onto the marble floor, as a slow hiss escaped his mouth. His eyes were staring up at me, but I didn't think they saw me or anything at all, because that misplaced hate was gone from them.

"The lot of you will die at my hand and then be consumed. The order does not matter," the Primarch said, turning from his kill to stare down at me. He flicked the fingers of one hand, like someone would dry off after using a wash bowl.

Warrick's death loomed in my mind, but so did the fact that this demon must have done over 20 damage with his bare hands to kill him in a single blow. It was an inhuman feat, nearly as unthinkable as the fact that Warrick had just saved me.

My Bodyguard stepped closer, her metal pauldron brushing my shoulder. I hadn't seen it happen, so I hadn't been able to command my Soul to intercede, and if I wanted to try and Heal Warrick, I needed this demon out of the way.

In a flurry of Source and my Epic Soul Ability, I summoned an elevated version of my Master Assassin, the most damaging of the options available to me.

He appeared in motes of red, just as bright as Warrick's blood, and leapt at my enemy before he was even fully solidified. The quick movements of my Master Assassin had always been hard to track with the naked eye, but now as a Grandmaster, he struck faster than I could follow, holding the blades in his hands instead of throwing them, slicing left then right.

For a wonder, the Primarch didn't strike back when the whirling Assassin finished his assault, meaning that for all his grotesque strength, the demon didn't have Fated damage. He also didn't have enough Armor or Toughness to stop 3 damage: indigo-colored blood leaked from the criss-crossing wounds my Soul had given him.

"No cards at all?" I said to him in disbelief. "You'll die for that arrogance."

He seemed unconcerned as he brought a finger to the wound, but still I trusted in the Venom. Until, that was, he lifted that same finger to his lips and licked it clean with a forked tongue.

"Mmm, delicious," he said. "A mix of hemlock and monkshood, yes?"

If his indifference to what should have been a mortal wound wasn't terrifying enough, that was when Fate finally granted me a clear view of his slitted eyes: they were rainbow-flecked diamonds, just like Hestorus's had been. My conviction teetered in that moment, staring into the face of a living Legendary. How could we possibly win an apotheosis against someone of his elevation? Better that than like this, a voice in my head said. Time is your ally, just as it was against Felstrife.

The thought steeled my resolve. Unlike Warrick, I had my usual layers of protection and wouldn't be brought low so quickly. But would they last long enough for me to summon Hymane? That was the question.

I was so focused on my next move and whatever the Primarch might do, that I didn't notice Hull's arrival – no doubt thinking to come to my aid – until it was too late.

"No, don't!" I shouted at him. "He's Legendary!"

Hull slammed to a stop and used the damage he'd been charging in his Talisman to blast the Primarch, a beam of burning energy sent straight at the monster's sloped brow.

Instead of the demon's head snapping back from the force of the attack, he opened his mouth wide, drinking it up. Hull, never one to be dissuaded, brought his Epic Hammer around, crashing it into the Primarch's leg, but it seemed to have no more lasting effect than my Assassin had, and I didn't see any Relics on the Primarch's person to be destroyed.

The Hammer hung limp now in Hull's hands, and so it was an easy thing for the Primarch to catch Hull by the neck, lifting him into the air.

"Daughter, why are you toying with this one?" the demon asked, as if he was having a casual dinner conversation.

Daughter? I thought, seeing the tailed demon who had run up behind Hull in a completely different light.

"Father, he's one of us," she said, looking up at the much larger Primarch. "The Order-born demon I told you about."

An explosion shook the room, and I saw the collection of Soldiers and Skeletons who had been clogging the entrance blow into shards. Morgane and Esmi were also hurled back from whatever Spell or Ability had been used, and my throat clenched to see them airborne. Morgane fetched up against the steps of the throne, while Esmi ricocheted off of the far wall. Morgane didn't move, and I saw the two Barracks he had summoned disperse, which meant he was either knocked out or dead. Esmi though, stood, a feral look on her face – her deck damaged, no doubt, but far from down.

"That is mine," a voice rang out with just as much authority as the Queen's. Yveda, Hull's mother, pulled everyone's attention, standing in the doorway, card shards raining around her like confetti. "Put it down."

The Primarch tilted his head in her direction. "I never thought I would see the day where my progeny agreed with this Yveda." He looked back to his daughter. "Have you been corrupted so quickly?"

My heart went out to my friend, struggling in the grasp of the mighty demon as the Nether-folk bickered, but I knew I had to use the distraction now or never at all. Quick as I could, I slipped around the pillar I had pinned Warrick to. A glance at my friend showed me he was well and truly dead, and I didn't dare try to recover his card now lest I meet a similar Fate.

Back to the hard marble, I pulled calming, centering Order through me and into the card I'd had time enough to cycle into my hand – I may not have been attacking during the last few moments, but neither had I been idle.

The card broke apart and reformed, leaving the Herald standing before me in all his fine regalia. Not daring to wait, I pushed the extra four Order Source into him, just as his card description said.

The Soul surprised me by looking my way. "What are you on about?"

"I'm having you start the apotheosis," I whispered back. It was the oddest thing: I could feel the Source I was trying to give him held at bay. "What are doing? Accept the payment. I command it."

"I am Mythic," he answered me with a sneer, his voice so loud I worried that with every word we'd be discovered. "I do not leap to obey like the lessers you are used to. Where is the King?" he demanded. "Where is Hestorus?"

I could have explained to him that it was the King himself who had set us on this path, or pointed out where Hestorus's card bathed across the room.

Instead, I grabbed the Soul by the lapels, shaking him in my grasp, which startled him. "There is no time for this," I hissed, pushing even more Order Source into him, grateful for the extra I had cultivated while Felstrife's prisoner. "Start the apotheosis."

The look of condescension he had been giving me switched to a pleased smirk. "Ah, now there is the face of a man who is willing to put his Soul on the line. Let's give them a show, shall we?"

He put the delicately fluted horn he held to his lips and the most clear sound I had ever heard came from it, like if hope had been given lungs and wished all the world to hear. My heart swelled as the note continued, on and on, longer than someone who needed breath would ever have been able to manage. Over the perfect sound, I could hear the demons finally coming my way, but as the note finally faded, everything slipped away with it, forms softening and colors bleeding out, until only white nothingness remained.