Spark of War (Progression Fantasy)

Nexin wasn't exactly in time to stop the attack, but the battle looked far from over as he streaked through the sky like a falling star. A quick glance showed him one of the fort's main gates had been breached, the heavy metal of it blown inward and left resting embedded in the wreckage of nearby buildings.

Monsters queued to get in, hangnails getting trampled by the larger seawyrms in the beasts' eagerness to get to the battle. And – admittedly – what a battle it was.

The Pilish forces had managed to set up a roadblock-slash-killbox using the layout of the street. Normally, that alone wouldn't have been enough to stop the tidal wave of hangnails and the far more dangerous seawyrms with them, but the armor-clad front line seemed to be another story. Almost identical to the fiery armor that'd attacked Nexin back in Vestis, these warriors slammed their fists into seawyrms hard enough to rock the monsters backwards.

Scales crumpled around the blows – though they didn't shatter – and gouts of fiery artillery followed close behind. With hundreds of regular Pilish soldiers lining the wide street and raining death upon the hangnails, the thirty or so Ashes – That was what Tas called them, wasn't it? – held off the larger seawyrms. More than held off, considering the two serpentine corpses.

But, even from his quick look, Nexin recognized that wouldn't last much longer. Even with hangnail corpses carpeting the road, the blockade was heavily pressured. More of the small creatures were scaling the walls, and though there hadn't been any major breaches – yet – there were at least three points where it was about to happen. Once the Ashes lost the fire support of the regular soldiers, the hangnails would swarm them. Sure, they'd kill them by the dozens, if not the hundreds, but they would be overwhelmed.

Unless Nexin stepped in.

Before that, though, his eyes went to two other scenes. First was the line of fog moving away from Fort Crimson, and the dozens of prisoners bound in cloud-like manacles next to it. Soldiers and civilians alike, from the looks of it, they were being led towards where the bridge had been destroyed. Unfortunately for the Depths, they didn't know Nexin had already taken care of what he'd found hiding under the water there. Still, he couldn't let them take the prisoners.

That took him to the second thing of note outside the city – the three black and white humanoids rushing towards him on chairs – No, thrones? – of dark water. The same liquid that'd protected the avatar from his and Sol's attacks. Laze and Nidina had mentioned something like these creatures being present at the first fort they'd arrived at to defend.

Some kind of command caste? Elite warriors?

Maybe he'd leave one of them alive enough to ask some questions.

Maybe.

All that taken in during the few seconds Nexin approached Fort Crimson, he ignited a flaming sword in each hand, then immediately compressed them to their plasma state. Coronas of heat and power flooded off the weapons, causing the three approaching warriors to seemingly hesitate in their approach.

Too bad for them, Nexin didn't hesitate as well.

With his six small, plasma wings rocketing him through the sky like a shooting star, his change in direction came so quickly, the new target on his right didn't even have time to register what was happening. Dark water began to shift near the foot of the throne, but Nexin's sword was already in motion. Glowing, molten plasma came around in an arc, simultaneously cutting and disintegrating the black and white flesh of the warrior's abdomen.

Hungry as fire always was, the passing weapon didn't simply cut through, and instead consumed the body six inches around where the blade traveled. With a foot of its chest suddenly missing, the creature was dead before it felt any pain, and its remaining parts began their long tumble to the ground far below. The dark water making up the throne it had flown on – and likely the source of any weapons it would use – had lost its consistency the moment the creature had died.

Without waiting for the body to fall, or for the other two warriors to react, Nexin stepped to the second creature. This one had started to respond, the dark water from the throne reaching out like it would form into a sphere of some kind around the seated monster. Would. It was far too slow, and Nexin's second sword flashed down in a single, overhead chop.

The two severed halves of the warrior joined the pieces of the first warrior in their descent towards the surface below. With two down and one to go, Nexin didn't instantly step over to the third to finish the job. He still had a bit of time before the blockade would be breached, and the prisoners weren't really going anywhere. Now was the best time to learn a little about what these new enemies were capable of.

In the seconds after its allies fell, the third warrior managed to erect a globe of dark water around it, the surface of it rippling like waves on a stormy sea. Completely opaque, Nexin couldn't see what the creature was doing within the liquid, but his attention quickly turned to the spikes rising out of the waves. Each as long as his forearm, the spikes gave off a feeling of condensed power, similar to what the Firestorm's weapons felt like.

"Good, show me what you can do," Nexin said quietly as flames danced around the soles of his boots, and he walked across the sky towards his opponent, fiery footprints remaining in his path. He didn't have to wait long, the spikes launching out of the watery globe with the power and speed of ballista bolts.

Up came his swords, parrying aside the first, second, third, fourth spikes, with sweeping cuts that left shimmering air in the wake of his blades. The fifth spike he leaned to the left, cleanly avoiding it, while the sixth passed directly under his foot as he casually raised his leg to continue his walk forward. Even as his foot came back down, his opponent changed tactics, long tentacles following the spikey barrage.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Not looking to get tangled – and needing more data on the warrior's abilities – Nexin pushed power into the plasma wings on his back, and shot off to the side. Restraining himself to probe the strengths of the tentacles, he kept his speed at about twenty percent. The flexible appendages snapped in his direction to give chase, more and more liquid flooding out of the sphere, though it didn't shrink in size.

Not bad. Six of the watery arms – each with another of those spikes at the end – raced after Nexin. No doubt they would attempt to do unpleasant things if they caught up to him. If. Nexin pushed his thrust up to twenty-five percent, the plasma wings on his back thrumming with power. That seemed to be the limit the tentacles could reach. Not bad. Against an average Firestorm – one without the plasma-state wings – the tentacles would likely be able to keep up. Above average, or with the ability to flare their wings, however, and the Firestorm should easily be able to outrun them. Which meant they likely had another strength, perhaps flexibility?

Cutting power to his forward thrust, Nexin rolled one hundred and eighty degrees, completely flipping over until he was facing the other direction – towards the chasing appendages – then reengaged. Inertia pushed against him, but his flame armor and wings were more than enough to blast him in the other direction so abruptly, he didn't even seem to pause in the air. Like the tentacles were surprised by his abrupt change in direction, they hesitated for the briefest heartbeat before spreading out to strike from multiple angles.

Plasma swords still in hand, Nexin didn't lash out as the first tentacle reached him, instead rolling to the right just enough for the spike to flash past him. There had to be a trick to… ah, there it was. Out of the side of the limb beside him, foot long hooks burst out of the water, trying to snag and rip him apart. They were fast, lunging straight for Nexin's face and body, but not fast enough. A slight push of power on his wings pulled him back, just as the second and third tentacles arrived.

Already with the vicious hooks extending from them, they came striking in from different sides to box in his movement. Still too slow to keep up with him, he darted up and then left to avoid, taking the easy openings between their attacks – which led him directly into the path of the final three attacking limbs. Unlike the first three, these ones didn't come stabbing in, but instead sweeping. The "body" of these tentacles was much thinner than the first three, but the lengths of the spikes out of the sides were more than triple. Between the coordinated assault of the three limbs and their overlayed hooks, it would be impossible for him to pass through.

Except… he didn't even try.

Nexin flexed his lower back, forward momentum ceasing so suddenly he shot straight up at a ninety-degree angle. Pushing his thrust to thirty percent, he zipped along the length of the tentacles – just out of reach of the hooks – even as they continued to fall towards him. Flying almost in a circle to evade the attack, he watched the tentacles carefully, waiting for the next trick. None came. Was that the best they could do?

Without slowing his speed, Nexin's left hand snapped out, plasma sword sweeping around in an arc of molten light fifty feet long. With an explosive whoosh, the three tentacles evaporated in a cloud of violent steam, and Nexin rolled to aim towards his opponent. Predictably, the remaining trio of appendages was already stabbing directly for him, but he met them with another sweeping slash from his right sword.

Cutting straight down their lengths, the explosive evaporation burst into a tunnel of dirty fog, but Nexin didn't slow. He shot through the mist, the power of the dark water shattered by his attack, until he emerged from the other side, sword already swinging. The waves on the sphere of water rushed to meet him, thickening and hardening to create a shield between him and the occupant inside.

How strong would it be?

Nexin brought his sword down with the finality of the setting sun, waves parting beneath the molten edge with little more resistance than normal water would provide. The warrior inside fared no better, and as soon as Nexin's sword reached its head, the watery sphere lost its cohesion. By the time he finished his swing, two halves of the black and white humanoid fell to join the others of its kind on the ground below.

He nodded to himself, cataloging the data he'd collected in his head to pass on to Laze when they spoke next. The new enemy was more dangerous than the hangnails for sure, and more intelligent than the seawyrms. While they didn't possess the same brute strength as the serpentine enemies, they would likely prove more difficult for the Firestorm to deal with, and would need to be prioritized as targets.

With those opponents dealt with, Nexin turned his attention to the foggy procession of prisoners. To his senses, their Sparks glowed even within the fog that'd spread to encompass them, but it was the other "glows" he focused on. The more he fought the troops of the Fathom, the more he gained a taste for what powered them. That dark water used by the black and white humanoids was like the flames used by those… blessed… by the Pyre – a physical manifestation of their god's power. After directly battling the water used as a weapon, he had a pretty good idea what it felt like, which meant there were nine more of those fog-controlling humanoids down there.

Easy enough.

Hovering high above, Nexin ignited a plasma bow in his hand, arrows appearing one after the other on the string in front of him. Getting the idea from the trick Laze had demonstrated, he found himself unable to split the arrows like she did. Instead, he simply created extras. They wouldn't be connected like the barrage Laze could produce, but that wasn't he wanted now anyway. Within the blink of an eye, he held the ends of nine plasma arrows, and drew back the bow. Eyes flicking back and forth from target to target, he set his aim and then released.

BOOM, the arrows launched off his bow with enough force to spread a circular shockwave of compressed heat vertically around Nexin. Before that sound even reached the ground, however, the arrows did. Striking with the speed and accuracy of vengeful lightning, the arrows pierced the fog – and the chests of the enemies hiding within.

No violent explosions followed the impacts, but the white mist fell to the ground like it had physical weight and then dissolved, leaving the dozens of prisoners looking around confused. Spotting a break in the nearby stone-spike forest free of enemies, Nexin stepped down to appear next to the prisoners. The nearest man – a soldier by the looks of his Pilish uniform – nearly jumped out of his skin at Nexin's arrival, but flames were far more comforting than fog or dark water for the beleaguered people.

"Firestorm," the soldier said, voice somewhere between fear and hope.

"You can't go back to the fort or to the bridge," Nexin said, lifting his sword to point behind the soldier in front of him. "Go that way and hide within the forest."

"Hide?" another soldier asked. "For how long? They'll come after us. Even if they don't, how will we know when it's safe to come out?

Nexin smirked. "Don't worry, you'll know." Then he turned and launched back towards the fort. Time to clean up the rest of the trash.