Chapter 313: The Four Pillars of Hell—Necrobix (2)

Calamity descended upon Elfo Sagrado. Karin and Ignisia drew on every last reserve to resist, and the elves added their small strength without hesitation. They fought with their lives on the line against Necrobix.

However, that was not the only place where disaster had come. At that same moment, the great Mage Tower spearing the sky beyond the clouds was all but a vision of hell. In truth, it would not be wrong to call it Hell itself, because Necrobix stood there as well.

“An edifice raised by a young mage,” Necrobix murmured, sounding genuinely intrigued. “It is not badly made. Worth analyzing.”

One of the mages on the tower’s outer defensive line trembled so hard his teeth chattered.

His name was Guraishan. He had once crossed paths with Ketal on the road to the Barcan Estate when Ketal went to confront Ashetiaar. After a grueling journey, he had finally reached the tower and begun learning magic as an apprentice, and now his eyes shook as if madness had seized him.

“This... this cannot be...,” Guraishan stammered.

Because the situation in the Mortal Realm was dire, the Mage Tower had raised its highest alert. The Tower Master and his disciple had layered personal defenses across the tower, and numerous mages stood watch. The barrier should have turned away even an enemy at the rank of Hero. Yet the only one left breathing here was Guraishan.

The tower’s wards and the mages’ counterattacks had shattered at a flutter of the intruder’s hand. Spells broke like glass. Mages choked blood and fell where they stood.

“Magic on the Mortal Realm has advanced,” Necrobix said, as if offering a passing critique.

Guraishan had not survived because he was talented. His hands had frozen in numb terror, and he had failed to cast anything at all.

Necrobix, a being that defied understanding, drifted toward the tower and laid a hand against its perimeter. A single sound like a struck bell split the sky, and the barrier collapsed.

The ward that had guarded the tower for centuries without once trembling disintegrated in an instant. The shockwave flung Guraishan to the ground and tore blood from his lips; he lost consciousness on the spot. Necrobix advanced and reached toward the tower itself.

A keen, shrilling hum answered its touch and shoved its hand away. Someone had intervened. A sliver of interest flickered in Necrobix’s eyes.

“Well now,” Necrobix said.

“What is happening here?”

The Tower Master’s disciple, Elian, streaked into view. He had been elsewhere when the alarm reached him, and he rushed here as fast as he could fly. The moment his gaze met Necrobix, he swallowed hard.

“A demon...!”

Elian knew this demon was not a common one. Even he could not measure the being’s standing. The presence felt like a god. In truth, it felt worse than that. By Elian’s reckoning, only four beings in existence possessed such stature.

“One of the Four Pillars of Hell...,” he stammered.

“Elian,” the demon said, tasting the name. “Disciple of the Tower Master. You interest me as well.”

“Pierce!” Elian chanted. He did not waste breath on talk. He unleashed his full power from the first heartbeat. His spell was a command laid upon the world, an incantation akin to Dragon Tongue..

“You analyzed the Dragon Tongue of edict and forged it into magic. Impressive. That is similar to me,” Necrobix said, watching with keen delight. It fixed its eyes on the spell that raced toward it and spoke softly. “Pierce.”

A command went out to the world itself. Necrobix’s magic broke Elian’s working and lunged for him. Elian threw up layered barrier magic in a blur and caught the strike. The impact rang like hammered steel. The physical blow was nullified completely. The mind’s shock was not.

Elian stared in disbelief. “You copied my magic?”

What Necrobix had cast was Elian’s own spell. The magic Elian had devised over a lifetime was imitated after seeing it once.

“It is not bad,” Necrobix said, almost lazily, “but its depth is shallow. Your security woven into the structure is sloppy.”

Elian coughed blood at the same moment as if the words themselves carried force. An inner impact rattled through him. He probed his body in a flash and felt his pupils widen. The demonic energy had slipped into him without his notice and now crept along the circuits of Myst and magic, defacing his body from within.

“When did you...?” he stammered.

“My demonic energy was within you from the moment you arrived. You did not die, which means you have potential. Given time, you might grow stronger.”

Necrobix flicked a finger. The tainted force surged to spear Elian through. Elian clenched his eyes as he braced for the end.

Just then, light descended. Necrobix’s face changed for the first time. It drew back.

A column of radiance fell and burned the place where it had stood. Even Necrobix had judged it better to dodge the attack. It spoke in a quiet voice that carried through the ruined air. “The Tower Master has come.”

“What kind of cursed joke is this?” the Tower Master exclaimed. A frame of polished bone stepped out of space, and Elian’s eyes flew wide.

“M-master? You were supposed to be on the far side of the continent to deal with the other threat.”

“I heard the alarm and came at once. You look a sight.”

“Forgive me...”

“It’s okay. If that is the opponent, there was nothing else to be done. Stand down and recover.”

Space stretched at the Tower Master’s word. The tower itself slid away across the landscape and settled on the far horizon, as if pushed along the seam of reality.

“You slid the entire structure by pressing on space,” Necrobix observed. “That is appropriate. Simple sealing or guarding serves little purpose against me.”

“Why are you here?” the Tower Master asked, voice low and flat, “and how could a being like you descend here at all?”

Even a lich who had severed his life from his body could not comprehend what stood before him. Necrobix, founder of dark magic and one of the Four Pillars of Hell, stood here in person on the Mortal Realm. This was no mere avatar. This was Necrobix’s true self. It was as if a god’s very essence had stepped into the Mortal Realm to act freely—and no, it was worse than that.

“How,” the Tower Master said again, as if testing the word, “is this possible?”

When Ferderica had opened the celestial passage before, the shock had echoed across the whole continent. Yet the Mortal Realm had not sensed Necrobix’s descent. It should have been impossible. That was only the first impossibility.

The second stood before him, and it spoke without shame.

“Why,” the Tower Master said, staring, “are you here as well?”

“Oh,” Necrobix replied, and its eyes brightened. “You perceived the others, even across such a distance. That is impressive.”

The Tower Master let out a short, mirthless breath. “There are not two of you. There are three—three originals, not avatars—present on the Mortal Realm at the same time.”

Three true selves of Necrobix existed in the world at once.

“You are a calamity itself. What method could you possibly have used to achieve this?” the Tower Master said.

“You are a mage,” Necrobix said, smiling faintly. “Analyze it with your own power.”

A creeping darkness seeped from it, slow and sure as oil. The Tower Master went still the instant he recognized the quality of that shadow.

“That...” the Tower Master stammered. He sensed the immediate danger. Even as a Lich, a being who could not die so long as his life vessel endured, he judged that power enough to end him here and now.

“What is that?” the Tower Master asked Necrobix.

“It is the force that once killed more beings in this world than any other. The power of our old enemy,” Necrobix answered. It lifted a hand and drew on death. “You will not understand it, so do not trouble yourself. Now then, mightiest mage of the Mortal Realm, show me your true strength.”

Necrobix’s power flared. The Tower Master gathered mana on a scale that bent the air and raised his hand.

***

At that same hour, in the Dwarven Cave of Mantamia, Serena was on patrol. With a puzzled expression, she approached a dwarf sentinel.

“Excuse me, do you know where Ketal went? I came back to the inn after a walk, and he wasn’t there.”

“He has entered a Dungeon,” the dwarf replied calmly. “We left several nearby Dungeons untreated while we were fighting the evil. He heard and went to clear them.”

“Oh, I see. In that case, I suppose I will follow him, since I have little else to do. Would you tell me which one he chose?”

“As you please. I will mark the location.”

The dwarf treated Serena with reverence, as it could not have been otherwise. Serena was the Holy Sword, a gift their god had bestowed upon the world. Now that gift moved by her own will, carrying divine favor. To the dwarves, she was no different from an angel shaped directly by their deity, and it was only natural that they honored her.

Serena thanked him and turned to go.

Just then, the world pressed down. A crushing presence drove the breath from chests. The dwarf who had been speaking went stark white.

“Ah... ah...”

His mind buckled under the pressure and threatened to break. Serena startled and released light that wrapped the area. The dwarf gasped and dragged air into his lungs under that radiance. Serena stared toward the far side of the holy land, her face drained of color.

“Wait...!” Serena shouted.

Something dreadful had come here.

“So this is the place,” Necrobix murmured. It stood in the dwarves’ holy land as if it had merely decided to appear, and reality had obeyed.

It hummed a little tune as it walked. In that moment, a dwarf shot toward it at great speed, hammering the air with runic force.

“Grombir,” Necrobix said. “Saint of the God of the Forge.”

“You... you are Necrobix!”

One of the Four Pillars of Hell had come. Necrobix’s eyes rested on Grombir. The dwarf’s instincts screamed. He raised a shield with every ounce of speed he possessed.

“O strongest shield, protect me!” Grombir chanted.

“The shield forged by the dwarves of the Mortal Realm will shatter beneath my will,” Necrobix chanted.

Steel groaned like a dying beast as the shield crumpled in a heartbeat. Grombir poured desperate craft into hardening it, but the pressure mounted faster than his reinforcement, and the guard finally shattered. A second impact ripped through his stance, and darkness seized him.

“I will not kill you. We need you,” Necrobix crooned, almost playfully.

As darkness opened like a mouth to swallow him, a blade of gold sang through the air and cut the shadow cleanly. Grombir tore himself free and flew backward.

“Are you all right?” Serena asked him.

“I... thank you.”

“The Holy Sword?” Necrobix tilted its head as it looked at Serena. “Why do you bear the form of a human? This is no mere imitation—it is true flesh and blood. ...Is this the work of the God of the Forge?”

Interest returned to the demon’s eyes. Serena gulped and set her feet.

“I will hold it! Call Ketal for help! Please!” she shouted.

“I will!” Grombir sprinted inward.

Necrobix smiled and raised a hand. Darkness surged forth, a branching flood carrying the power to unmake everything it touched. Serena drew a sharp, fierce breath and clenched her fist in defiance.

Light wrapped her from crown to heel. She sprang and threw her punch. A bloom of brilliance erupted and burst the shadows apart. For the first exchange, Serena met Necrobix’s attack cleanly.

“The Holy Sword lives up to its name,” Necrobix murmured.

In human form, the Holy Sword possessed power on the level of a Hero. Holy power also held an innate advantage over evil. The world’s boundaries had fractured, and that advantage no longer obeyed its old law without condition, but at the level of the Holy Sword, the difference still mattered. Serena broke the darkness and drove straight at the demon.

Necrobix spoke as if to itself. “If Raphael were here, even he would not find this easy.”

Which was another way of saying it would only be difficult, but still far from sufficient.

“The shadow will seize a tool of the heavens and bring it to its knees,” Necrobix chanted.

Shadows rose everywhere. They budded from tree trunks, seeped from stone, and poured out of the thin white cover drifting above. They closed in on Serena from every angle.

She weighed her options in a single breath. Defense would only hold for a time and then fail, and running away gained her nothing against an adversary who could be anywhere at once. That left only one choice.

I need to attack it,

Serena decided inwardly. She wreathed herself in holy power and charged. The nearest shadows burned away, but even more rose up and seized for her limbs. Several finally found purchase and bound her to the air.

However, Serena did not retreat. She leaned into the drag and drove herself forward. A raw cry tore from her as she forced the last of her strength down her arm and struck.

Yet, she did not reach it. Her fist stopped a handspan from Necrobix’s face. The cords of shadow that had sprung from everywhere held her completely.

“Damn it!” she cursed.

“The authority vested in you,” Necrobix said, studying her with a scholar’s attention, “does not lie within our reach.”

It made its decision.

“I will take you as well. I want to take you apart and see how you were made,” Necrobix said.

Serena’s eyes filled with fear.

Just then, something crossed the sky. Necrobix lifted its hand as if to brush aside a gnat, then froze. Instead of blocking, it withdrew and called up spires of shadow that jutted like the spears of a black forest to meet the intruder.

They shattered against a descending axe. Necrobix’s power, which had unmanned countless champions of the surface, tore like paper. The demon’s expression lost its careless pleasure.

“Piercing Round,” Necrobix chanted.

A bullet screamed through the air, the absolute shot that had punched through Ignisia’s defense as if it were mist. It smashed into the falling axe. A single, heavy note rolled over the holy land, and shockwaves swept in all directions. Mantamia shook hard enough to rattle every vaulted hall. Necrobix slid a step backward across the stone.

Serena pulled herself free in the buffet of wind and fled to the side, breath ragged. She turned and cried out with tears brimming.

“Ketal!”

“A strong enemy has come,” Ketal said as he stepped forward. “Fall back.”

“Please be careful. That thing is a monster. No, it is worse than a monster,” she whispered. She gulped and added what mattered. “That is Necrobix, one of the Four Pillars of Hell.”

She hoped the name would put him on his guard.

“The Four Pillars...,” Ketal murmured, eyes brightening. “Necrobix.”

He smiled as if a welcome puzzle had just been set before him.