The Hammer and the Fly (4/5)
While all this chaos is erupting all over the world, Lord Bal'Shazi is completely unaware; he's too drunk on euphoria to notice anything but himself.
And so, deep within his cave, we hear his voice droning on…, "What else can we do but spread our enlightenment? How miserable and depressed must the rest of the world be without the light of knowledge! As the servants of truth, isn't it our duty to correct the unbelievers? Isn't this our calling in righteousness, to make all others feel the same joy we feel?"
Down below, one of the cultists looks up in fear and whispers to his fellow cult-sister, "Do you hear that?"
"Hear what?"
"The rumbling. There's something really powerful coming from the surface…! I can feel it because I'm a mage!"
The cult-sister doesn't appear concerned at all hearing this. To her, it's so obvious that the mountain is quaking at their master's power, so she doesn't even bother giving a response.
She's also far too enthralled with Lord Bal'shazi's speech to think more than two seconds about her comrade's words.
"… and prepare to move out by sun fall!" the newly born god-king drones on with a dramatic voice that's slowly rising in pitch and intensity. "The wicked kingdom of Rudania will tremble in our presence!! We'll-"
The god-king is cut off when a shaft of sunlight suddenly opens up on the ceiling, and a ton of rocks and debris fall from above, where a hole had been drilled from the surface down to this cavern.
Through the hole, a lone figure jumps through and lands in the middle of the crowd of acolytes. The whole room is dark, yet the subtle silver glow around the stranger makes it easy to identify his features.
First off… this man isn't black or brown-skinned, like everyone these people have known. Instead, he's more of an olive color. On top of that, the stranger has two rounded animal ears on top, and he has black and orange coloring in his hair. Propped up behind him is a similarly colored cat's tail. The people closest to the stranger can even see claws extending out of his fingertips.
Of course, there are no jungles on this desert world, so none of these people have ever seen a tiger before – nor a Rehkin, for that matter. These people have no way of knowing what he is.
The only thing the Arch necromancer's disciples can do is step back and mutter anything between, "What's that?!" and "Kill it!"
The more aggressive of the cultists rush forward eagerly and… fall to the ground after being rent in several pieces by the Tiger Rehkin's claws.
The Tiger man lifts his hand up to his mouth and licks some of the blood off his claws.
Of course, the cultists here can't understand his language…, but they really don't need to. Due to the aggressive, bloodthirsty Aura the "monster" is emitting and seeing how the creature is eagerly pursuing them, it's very clear why this thing came here.
Even with thousands of human cultists here, surrounding the monster, the thing's claws are too sharp, and the intimidating Aura around "it" is so palpable that no one is even able to put up a good fight.
With their morale completely crushed, some cultists flee, while a few look up to their god and call out, "He's too strong! Our Lord will save us!"
The old necromancer looks at the man-tiger monster and thinks to himself confidently, 'Hmph! It's merely a 7th-Gate Ascendant. If this had been a few minutes ago, I'd have had a tough time fighting it. Now, I'll show you why a god is something to be feared.'
Right when Bal'Shazi lifts his hands up and prepares to call down a terrible curse... he suddenly feels a sense of unprecedented fear in his heart, and it's not coming from the "strange monster".
Before the Necromancer Lord can wonder if this feeling is just a figment of his imagination, the entire mountain above him is ripped out by the roots.
Looking up in horror, Bal'shazi sees a giant, scaled beast of some kind lifting up the mountain as one would lift up a pot lid to see the tasty treats inside.
<
Of course, the Elder Dragon's voice is so low that Lord Bal'shazi can't actually make out any words; instead, he just feels the ground vibrating, and he feels every particle in his body shaking.
When his "fight, flight, or freeze" instincts activate, Lord Bal'shazi decides to fight.
Just when the necromancer's energy is starting to condense into a horrifying ball of Black Aura, he suddenly feels all his power trickle away.
Looking down in horror, Bal'shazi sees millions of strange demons spilling into the inside of the mountain through the opening the giant dragon made. All of these demons have pointed ears, and some of them have tails trailing behind them. All of them are leaking auras of pure madness and hatred.
Some of his worshippers are pleading for mercy in vain as they're dismembered by the flood of "demons".
In particular, Bal'shazi sees one portly fellow – the second son of some nobleman who happened to be one of his chief investors – be dragged off by one of the pointy-eared demons. As the fat man is dragged across the ground, his hands catch onto a rock jutting out of the ground, and he clings to it for dear life.
One of the pointy-eared demons runs up and rips his hands off by the wrists, then gives a short salute while the nobleman's son is dragged away with his bleeding stumps and thrown into a pit.
Inside the pit...are all of his fellow acolytes being piled up like dirty rags.
Bal'Shazi sees the knife-eared demons conjuring up a transparent liquid and pouring it into the pit, and he can recognize the smell. It's a flammable liquid (gasoline)!
He briefly sees his remaining disciples look over at him pleadingly, "Save us, Master Bal'shazi!"
Seeing so many dead already and their master being powerless to stop it, many of the necromancers' faith in their lord is shaken.
As their faith in their god-king weakens, so do his powers. 'I... I have to save them!'
Just as he looked away to the "demons" and prepares to counterattack, the dragon staring at him from above is displeased at being ignored, <
Feeling miffed, the Elder Dragon reaches down with a single claw and squished the puny god-king to death.
---------------------
With the Necromancer Lord defeated, we see a horde of maddened Arkin standing over the pit, and they're casting the remaining cultist survivors inside.
Seeing the cultists all struggling to climb back up the pit, many of the Arkin are jeering at them, while some are spitting out, "Bah! Baby snatchers!" "Murderers!" "Burn them!" "BUUUUURRRRRNNN!" "AAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!"
One of the Arkin can't take the anticipation anymore, and he snaps his fingers. He uses the friction as the catalyst to cast a simple Spark spell. He conjures the spark and flicks it down into the pit.
The spark falls down and lands on the flammable liquid. Then, when a single swoosh, the entire pit is engulfed in flame.
All the Necromancy disciples look up, and in their last moments, they see a ring of pointy-eared demons staring down at them with the light of the fire illuminating their ominously glowing eyes and casting evil, sadistic shadows on their faces from below.
Just before their lives flickered out, some of them could swear that the demons are cracking smiles.
---------------------
By the time any summoned gods show up (particularly Master Gayhal) arrives at the scene, all of the necromancers are already dead.
Of course, the Arkin here are far too consumed with madness to bother looking for survivors; they're too busy stomping on the fallen corpses and chewing on some of the necromancers' ashen remains.
With all the enemies taken care of, Master Gayhal walks through the cavern system, and he comes across a room filled with countless cages.
When he sees what's inside the cages, he frowns, and a sharp edge leaks out of his Aura. 'There are at least 100,000 children here. Where are their parents?'
He then looks down and sees the massive pools of blood on the ground, which are slowly seeping into the gutters.
Seeing the blood, Gayhal already knows where the parents went. No doubt, if you're a necromancer, and you're trying to save some sacrifices for later, it's always better to sacrifice the adults first and keep the children; children can't escape or rebel so easily.
Letting out a disappointed sigh, Gayhal waves his hands, and all the cages unlatch themselves.
Immediately, the captured children spill out. Some are crying, some are looking lost, and the youngest ones are calling for their parents - not understanding what fate befell them.
Before the children can riot or run into the crazed Arkin just down the hall, Gayhal sweeps his hand across them all, and he casts a spell over them all.
As the bespelled children fall to the ground, the god casts a levitation spell on them to prevent them from falling to the ground and hitting their heads. He then slowly lowers them and sets them down.
With the children all sedated, Master Gayhal pulls out a far speak enchantment and speaks into it, "This is my steward, right?"
"Yes, master," comes an old woman's voice on the other end.
"Good. I'm going to send you a location. I want you to send some people over here with food and clothing for children of all ages. I want them moved off-world and given homes."
"How many?" the servant asks.
"I haven't counted. Just bring a couple million changes of clothes, just to be safe."
As for why he's going to move the kids off-world? It's simple.
This world is technologically unadvanced. With so few resources to spare, no one is going to want to take care of so many orphans. Even if he dropped them off at the nearest city, almost all of them will have starved to death by the end of the year. The ones who don't die horribly would be captured and used as slaves.
Being so close to the Death King, Master Gayhal certainly has many connections on most of the more wealthy worlds. It's best to move these children there, where the local civilizations will actually have the abundance to actually take care of them.