Prologue I

Caspian walked through the hail of bullets. He did not hesitate; he did not worry; he did not lose his stride. The enemy infantry continued their barrage, yet none of their shots seemed to be hitting the target. To be missing every shot at this range... it was unheard of.

Even more confusing was that the person—thing?—standing before them didn't seem to be using shield magic.

However, they were having difficulties seeing their opponent at all, so any guess was simply conjecture.

As he walked slowly towards the enemy, Caspian observed their minds using his 'third eye': a mutation which allowed him to see the invisible shadowlands where the human spirit resides, and which in this case he used to attack the very core of their being. All he need do was reach out and crush his enemy's spirit, which would give them true death; there were many psychics in the world who could perceive the spirit realm with a third eye, but among them only Caspian had the ability to change what he saw.

I have a vision for this world.

I will succeed.

Caspian's shade reached out with superhuman speed to grab the shadow-brains of his enemies, the unknown organ which provided them with consciousness. His shade caressed their minds, savoring their fear, their dread, their terror—he drank them up, relishing the intensity of the emotions and the strength of their wills, only to promptly crush their shadow-brains with the long, firm grasp of his own shade.

Even though the organ was but a shadow of their physical brain, its destruction would cause people to enter a vegetative state from which there was no recovery. Without external life support, their bodies would shut down within minutes.

This was the fate which was in store for all who opposed Caspian.

No one will stand in my way.

Caspian turned his attention to the warships on the horizon, their guns blazing as they directed volley after volley towards him.

To Caspian, there was no difference between an artillery shell and a bullet.

He closed his eyes and the entire invasion fleet was removed from existence with a single thought. Later, historians would relate the vanishing of the fleet to a massive eruption of energy in the remote Gobi Desert, which was presumed at the time to be a weapons test. Those same historians would overlook the fact that this single eruption was more potent than any collection of weapons known to man.

***

It began in the morning.

Arthur Trevena was a university underclassman on a holiday jaunt to the Maldives Protectorate, the easternmost territory of the Kingdom of Britannia, who now found himself just a few hundred meters removed from the front lines.

Walking with his friends along a beach in Addu, they noticed that the horizon was darkened by a vast amount of blackish-grey spots, which one of them identified as ships.

"What's that?" asked one of his friends, pointing at what appeared to be an expanding shadow on the water.

The realization hit Arthur suddenly and brought with it the understanding that this vacation was not going to end well.

Landing craft. Dinghies with soldiers…enough for every archipelago here, he thought. If they follow the same tactics as the Philippine invasion…

His eyes widened.

"Everybody, defensive magic!"

But the enemy artillery did not wait for his friends to heed his warning. He witnessed the flash and heard the boom of heavy guns in the distance, and hurriedly began chanting the arcane sounds of a protection spell: "Onixdar arvin pax gigpah gemeganza! Onixdar arvin pax gigpah gemeganza! Onix—!!"

A shell disintegrated in a flash of green light above his head. It was a low-level spell, one designed to be used by anyone, but it was certainly effective: any fast-moving object which came within a certain radius of the caster would find itself the catalyst of its own undoing.

And now, as the bombardment continued and the once-blissful beach was rocked by a neverending stream of explosions, Arthur hoped with all his might that his friends had been able to chant defensive spells.

He ignored the voice in his head telling him to look around for as long as he could, but eventually he could resist no longer.

The remains of his friends, limp and lifeless, were scattered around the beach like fallen leaves, soon to crumble and become wormfood. The ground was stained red, the craters charred, the grass still burning. But the explosions themselves had stopped; looking up, he saw the familiar flashes of green light, along with an otherworldly glow emanating from the Kingdom's nearby military base.

Looks like they've activated the shields.

Arthur fell to his knees.

I am weak.

They were weak.

Everyone is weak.

He looked up and saw the landing craft, now clearly visible, only a couple minutes out from the beach.

He felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Can you stand, son?"

Arthur turned. A soldier, probably twice as old as him, was standing beside him. He had a weapon, an outdated magical assault rifle model, resting against his shoulder. Arthur could tell that, despite the relaxed posture, that weapon was ready to fire at a moment's notice.

There were more soldiers that Arthur could see taking up defensive positions behind this man. He looked towards the sea: Of course. An invasion force…artillery…landing craft. They'll be here any second now.

How did our soldiers get here so fast?

Oh.

They were expecting this attack.

They must've been trying to catch the enemy off-guard, otherwise they would've blocked civilian travel to the islands…

Shaking, he stood and cleared his throat.

"I want to fight."

The aged soldier didn't say anything for a moment, but looked the young man up and down.

"You have training?"

"University Officers' Training Course, specialty in magic-accelerated combat."

The soldier nodded.

"Grab a rifle from our transport before it returns to base. Fall in with the defensive line. Check your shots, but do not hesitate. We have to hold out long enough for the cavalry to arrive."

"Yes, sir," Arthur replied. "…the cavalry?"

The older man cracked a grin, a small movement which gave Arthur unexpected confidence.

"If you survive, you'll be in for quite the treat."

Arthur did as the soldier instructed; he grabbed a rifle, an older M4-MA, and took cover behind a nearby rock formation just as the landing craft approached the beach.

The rest of the deployment began firing as soon as possible. Their goal was to sink the landing craft and pick off the soldiers that survived, which, in many cases, would have been an excellent strategy.

Despite being over twenty years old, the M4-MAs with which they were equipped were easily able to put holes in most light watercraft; they used runes which harnessed the energy from the ignition of the gunpowder to superheat the bullets and accelerate them up to ten times the speed of bullets from conventional weaponry.

To a human, any sort of body or head shot was fatal unless heavily armored. A limb hit by a round from an M4-MA would be obliterated, but the victim might survive. The best feature of this weapon, however, was the fact that the runes were inscribed into the shell casings themselves, instead of the chamber. This allowed modern magical ammunition to be used with any sort of firearm, which made magic-accelerated weapons mass-produceable and highly marketable.

The hull of a lightly-armored dinghy and the soldiers they carried should have been easy targets for such a weapon, if physical armor was all that they had to deal with.

Arthur was initially confused at the fact that only one of the landing craft went down—their fire surely covered a broader range than that. But then he saw the reason why: those all-too-familiar flashes of green light, which had previously been a safe and comforting force, were protecting the invaders.

"They've got talismans on the craft and on their armor. It'll be tough to hit them without disabling the talismans first."

The older soldier, who had been laying down cover fire for his comrades, knelt beside Arthur.

"Do we have any of those talismans?" Arthur asked desperately.

The soldier chuckled.

"I wish, kid. They've got to be pretty complex runes if they can distinguish between friend and foe like that. Nothing like the simple defense chants we're trained to use. We don't have the budget."

"What about counter-magic?"

"Not our specialty. Can you use it?"

Arthur looked behind him and saw a raven perched nonchalantly on a piece of driftwood, watching the pair intently. He made his decision.

"I can try."

The soldier didn't take his eyes off the enemy, yet Arthur still felt the soldier's gaze examining him.

"Do it."

"Cover me."