The Storm King

The thrum of the magical engines could be felt throughout the entire ark, proving surprisingly calming for Leon. It was a reminder of how far he’d come in so short a time. No longer on the defensive, he now had the strength to assert himself over the cities of the Far West.

Not too far ahead, he could see the forces of Shatufan scrambling to prepare for his arrival. He’d reach the city’s suburbs outside of its walls in less than an hour, and civilians had already largely been cleared out of the streets while the city guards manned the walls—or at least, manned them as much as they could; there were clearly fewer guards than the walls demanded.

Manuchehr stood prominently on top of the largest gatehouse facing Leon’s oncoming fleet. Other finely dressed men stood at his shoulder—likely many of the remaining Azadan in the city, or at least those that supported him. They were presenting a united front against him, showing to their city that they weren’t running, that they were right there with the city’s defenders.

While Leon held a lot of anger toward the city for abandoning their vital trade deal the second Terris set foot on the southern coast, he had to admit that seeing so many of the city’s elite there, apparently ready to resist him as much as they could, struck a chord within him. Some amount of respect bloomed, even if it wasn’t nearly enough to deter him from continuing on his current course.

His fleet spread out across the sky on its final approach. Shatufan was a large city, and Leon’s fleet needed to cover a lot of ground in order to secure its entrances and exits, not to mention the greater distance would give his arks greater maneuverability when Lances started firing.

In the last few minutes, MALLs, giants, Ulta suits, and fighters began disgorging from the larger arks. As Bolt in Shadow made its final approach, Manuchehr and a dozen other Azadan took off from the gatehouse roof, the weaker members aided by flight enchantments. None of them were particularly threatening, though Leon kept an eye on the tenth-tier mage in the entourage—the last one in the city, if his count was accurate.

Leon grabbed several of his friends, family, and a dozen Tempest Knights—including two giants—and headed out to meet the city representatives, leaving orders with Anshu and Xanthippe not to commence the attack until he gave the order. Siddi also accompanied him, piloting his repaired Ulta suit.

As they spilled out into the sky, Manuchehr’s group halted in the air about two hundred feet or so from the gatehouse, well within range of their Lances—not that that would help much if violence broke out.

It seemed likely to Leon that violence would break out, given the deathly glare that Manuchehr gave him as he revealed himself and flew over, his people at his back. If looks could kill, Leon would’ve already been dust in the wind from Manuchehr’s expressed antipathy alone.

“Manuchehr!” Leon called out as he halted several dozen feet away from the Presiding Magus, his people spreading out behind him, leaving only Valeria, Cassandra, Maia, and Anzu beside him. “Have you come out to negotiate terms?”

“I certainly have!” Manuchehr shouted back, startling Leon a bit with how faded his accent had become in so short a time. “Turn your horde back from civilization’s walls, brute, and perhaps you may live to see the morrow!”

“Arrogant swine!” Cassandra bellowed angrily, but any further responses were silenced when Leon raised his hand, the gesture all he needed to call for silence.

“Your confidence is inspiring,” Leon remarked.

“I’m not finished!” Manuchehr declared. “Retreat from Sentudon immediately! And provide hostages to Shatufan so that we can ensure that you do not break your word, as you did when you first ravaged my city, the jewel of the Far West!”

A smile spread across Leon’s face as thunder rumbled over the plain below. “Such a demand must be backed up by adequate power. Power which you do not have! So I’ll counter your offer with one of my own: throw down your weapons and open your gates! Surrender to me and you will live to see tomorrow!”

He made no further demands. The city was to be annexed, not negotiated with.

“Gods and men alike abhor oathbreakers more than anyone!” Manuchehr furiously shouted despite the picking up of the wind and the darkening of the sky. “You swore to me that my city had nothing to fear from you! You broke your word! I name you oathbreaker!”

“It was your city that broke faith with me first!” Leon retorted. “Not even half a year into our deal and you ceased trading vitally-needed supplies! When I came here to seek restitution, you continued to refuse! What surprise is it that I had to take action to secure the safety of my city when you abandoned us?!”

“What madness is it that think we should’ve incurred the wrath of the Ocean Lords by trading with you?! How could those supplies have even entered your city, stain as it is marring the face of the Nexus?!” As he shouted, Manuchehr drifted closer, apparently losing himself in his anger. “You cannot seriously expect us to take such risks when the costs would’ve been so high?!”

Leon averted his gaze for a moment. “Indeed,” he conceded. “Perhaps if you had continued to trade in limited volumes, I never would’ve come here and taken all of your Aurichalcum. Maybe then my city would’ve been too weak to defend herself. Maybe we wouldn’t have survived the Ocean’s tides in that case. Maybe then Terris would’ve moved on to sack Shatufan. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Regardless, you have proven yourself to be nothing less than an enemy of my city, and I will not suffer an enemy to exist, if I have the power to do anything about it!”

He paused a moment, noting that Manuchehr had continued to slowly approach. His Tempest Knights were tracking him closely, but Leon raised his defenses just in case.

Valeria, however, seemed to have less patience. “Stop right there!” she commanded as she conjured and raised her glaive toward the Presiding Magus.

“You would profane a parley with violence?” Manuchehr exclaimed.

“I would kill the enemies of my husband,” Valeria coolly replied, and from the way Cassandra and Maia were glaring at Manuchehr, Leon could see the sentiment shared.

“When I came here, Manuchehr,” Leon continued, forcing the conversation away from violence, “why did you not simply trade with me? I’ve heard you had reserves you could’ve traded with me in person. Why not dig into those when I asked?”

“Are you daft?” Manuchehr shouted. “Blind, deaf, and dumb? To trade with you at all would’ve provoked the Ocean Lords! I do what I must to protect my city, even if I must renege on a trading deal! What is my honor compared to the survival of my city?!”

Something in his tone screamed out to Leon to be cautious, and lightning began surging through his veins, speeding up his awareness and reaction time.

“I’ll ask one last time!” he shouted. “Surrender to me! Throw down your weapons and you’ll keep your lives! Resist, and my army will cut through you with ease!”

“There is no greater honor,” Manuchehr said, his voice suddenly calm and quiet, but growing louder as he proceeded, “than to die FOR ONE’S HOME!”

The Presiding Magus suddenly shot forward, a flash of light in his right hand indicating he’d summoned something. But faster than anyone could blink, Leon conjured Iron Pride and ran it through Manuchehr’s outstretched arm. Skin parted before the Adamant like butter before a hot knife, and the flesh beneath proved no greater obstacle. Bone shattered and nerves were severed, causing Manuchehr to drop what he’d been holding.

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Leon caught it with elementless magic and drew it towards him, revealing it to be a small vial filled with some kind of reddish-brown sand.

“FOR SHATUFAN!” Manuchehr roared, his voice straining through the pain. Leon sensed hidden spells beneath his clothes suddenly activate, and the Presiding Magus burst into intense flames, which roiled out from him and brushed against the vial.

Glass shattered, sand ignited, and Leon’s entire world became fire.

---

An explosion of spectacular force ripped through both sides. Orange-yellow fire pursued them as everyone, giants and Ulta suit pilots both, was thrown back from the explosion. Harsh heat hit Valeria like a brick wall, and she struggled to right herself in the air. Conjured ice helped with the heat, but as she straightened out and arrested her momentum, she felt her heart stop for a moment.

That vial had exploded practically right next to Leon’s face. That explosion, strong enough to throw everyone back—and apparently kill most of Shatufan’s weaker group—had originated barely a foot from Leon’s head. Fear gripped her like a vise despite how strong she knew her love was. She stared at the fireball for what felt like an eternity, barely registering what was happening around her.

She always considered herself to be a simple girl with simple desires. She wanted her family to be reunited, to live in peace and prosperity. Any threat to that dream was something to be crushed utterly. But she could barely move as the fear of seeing that dream potentially die with her husband dangled before her eyes.

From the orange-yellow fireball appeared flames as black as night, and a moment later, this black fire surged outward, consuming all the remaining fire that had enveloped Leon. When the fire died down, Valeria breathed a momentary sigh of relief before she saw her husband barely hovering in the air, bloodied and burned, all of his clothes consumed by the fire.

“T-Take… the city…” he sputtered before he began to lose altitude. Valeria rushed down with Anzu, catching Leon before he could fall completely. But he lost consciousness as he slumped over Anzu, who had taken to his griffin form.

Valeria held Leon’s head a moment, her eyes burning with unshed tears, utterly oblivious to the violence all around her. As far as she was concerned, none of that mattered. The only thing that mattered was making sure that Leon survived. She refused to lose the man she loved here, to a dishonorable act of treachery.

“Let’s go!” she called out to Anzu, steering the furious and worried griffin back toward Bolt in Shadow. The Tempest Knights followed readily while Maia and Cassandra did so only reluctantly, both looking ready to tear down the walls of Shatufan themselves with their bare hands.

But that hardly seemed necessary—the entire Shatufanian delegation had been ripped apart, both by the explosion and by the retaliation by Leon’s entourage. At almost the same time either Anshu or Xanthippe gave the fleet the order to attack, and they opened up on Shatufan with all their weapons. Lances peppered the walls with fire, concentrated mostly on the towers and gatehouses on the south side. Under the weight of such offensive power, Shatufan’s defenses were torn asunder, their own Lances not able to match the fleet’s firepower and being destroyed almost immediately.

Silver Spear and Bright Intent, meanwhile, fired their main cannons, showing precisely why the ark classes were called ‘destroyers’. Bright beams of light drowned out the light of the Origin Spark for a moment, cutting clean through the city’s outer walls. Explosions followed when the beams hit, and the ground forces surged toward these massive holes in the walls, along with the gatehouses.

That was the last Valeria saw of the taking of the city as she followed Anzu into Bolt in Shadow, Leon slumped over his back. Whatever happened to the city wasn’t her concern. As far as she cared, if the army burned it to the ground and slaughtered everyone within, it was what the city deserved, no matter what strategic materials they produced.

Her love had been heavily injured. That was all that mattered.

---

Pain ran through his body like fire. Magic soothed some of it, but Leon couldn’t help but groan as he returned to something that resembled consciousness. His power felt shaky and the magic flowing through his body felt shaky and irregular.

But he could feel himself healing. Slowly, but even a little bit helped. The pain he could deal with, but any damage to his magical foundation would be catastrophic. He still vividly remembered having to take a decade off serious training to give his soul realm and its connection to his physical body time to heal after ascending to the eighth-tier.

As clarity slowly returned to his mind, Leon cracked open his eyes and immediately regretted it. Light hit his eyeballs like nails, and he squeezed his eyes shut again.

“Fuck…” he croaked.

He sensed a presence next to him, large, powerful, and comforting.

“You’re finally waking up,” the Thunderbird whispered, her tone soothing and motherly. “I was worried.”

“Worried?” Leon murmured, his voice strained and creaking. “Why?”

“Your soul realm was damaged.”

Such a simple statement, but it sent shivers down Leon’s spine. He lost himself in denial for several long seconds before he cautiously began projecting his magic senses, making sure not to push himself too far before he was ready.

He found that he was lying on a lounge in his soul realm, the Thunderbird sitting next to him in her human form, gently running her hand through his hair. All around him, however, his Mind Palace had been trashed. The ground was torn up, holes had been punched in his timber palisade, and the buildings around him had been visibly damaged. Thankfully, his vault appeared mostly intact, but as his magic senses spread, he could see that the environmental damage extended past the palisade.

Thankfully the damage wasn’t that widespread through his soul realm—the cracks in the earth barely extended beyond the clearing of purple grass surrounding his Mind Palace—but it still worried him.

Above, he could feel his origin spark pulse with power, and it was easy for him to call upon a small hint of that power. With that one tiniest expression of origin power, his Mind Palace was almost completely repaired, the only sign of damage that remained was the cracks in his throne that now seemed far more serious than they had been a moment ago.

“Splendid…” the Thunderbird whispered. “Your subjects are doing well healing your body, but it was this damage that had me worried. If it’s this easily fixed, then you shouldn’t see any serious lingering injuries.”

Leon finally cracked his eyes open again, enduring the painful light and urging the eyes of his magic body to adjust quickly. “What happened?” he groaned.

“That man you were speaking with had a powerful explosive,” the Thunderbird explained. “Not powerful in the sense that it was a large explosion, but powerful in that it hit you in the soul realm, not just in your physical body. Whoever made it is skilled, though I’ve seen better in my time.”

Leon gasped as he forced himself up, the pain in his magic body intense, but rapidly fading as his origin power continued to flow. He could also feel the damage in his physical body start to heal more rapidly now that he was conscious and able to focus the flow of his power better.

As he sat in the lounge, he asked, “Is this something I’m going to have to deal with more often?”

“I’ve warned you about this before,” the Thunderbird reminded him. “Stronger mages have a greater ability to attack your soul realm, and you must be ready to be hit here. You were lucky that this explosion only did the damage it did.”

“Yeah. ‘Lucky’.” Leon struggled to his feet and began walking toward his throne, relief flooding through him as he saw the cracks on it slowly close as his body continued healing.

“Be careful, my boy,” the Thunderbird warned. “I doubt that hypocritical cretin made that explosive on his own.”

Leon nodded. “Hopefully the maker is still in the city,” he stated. “If they could do this to me… I wonder what they could make for me?”

The Thunderbird burst out laughing, and even Xaphan over in his pavilion joined in.

With that, Leon sat on his throne and opened his physical eyes. It took a second or two longer than usual, but he could feel the damage causing that healing, too. This injury shouldn’t cause any lasting damage, though he’d be taking it easy for a while, just in case.

When his eyes opened, he was greeted by three very worried wives. He was lying in bed, Valeria sitting next to him while Maia and Cassandra took turns pacing by the projected window.

“…ll them all,” Cassandra murmured. “Not a single tear.”

Maia nodded in agreement with her statement, though Leon wasn’t quite sure what she’d said.

Valeria, however, gasped as he stirred, and the other two seemingly forgot their conversation and hurried over to his bed.

“Leon!” Valeria exclaimed. “You’re awake!”

“That seems to be true,” Leon replied, his throat struggling to get the words out. Before they could say anything else, he ignored the pain and asked, “The city? What happened?”

“The city’s been… taken,” Valeria hesitantly stated. “No one took kindly to Manuchehr’s actions.”

“Those faithless dogs got what they deserved!” Cassandra vehemently added. “If my man wasn’t hurt, I’d have been out there with them!”

[No retaliation is too much for such treachery,] Maia added in agreement.

Leon glanced out the window. As far as he could tell, it was facing the city, but it was hard to tell through all the smoke. If the city had been taken, it seemed that his forces had been none too gentle in its seizure. Given how many healing spells were covering his body and how much pain he still felt despite that, he struggled to care too much.

For the moment, he was content in the knowledge that the city had been taken, and he laid back to continue healing. By his estimation, he’d be back on his feet in a matter of hours. He could trust his commanders to handle the city until then.