XLI.

XLI.

Jakob sniffed the flask that Harland had brought with him. There was a faint scent of something familiar lingering along the glass rim.Updated from novelb(i)n.c(o)m

Why were you taking this?

The Gold-Ranker hesitated.

If you dont tell me why, I cannot help you.

Desperation seemed to seize the man and he grabbed Jakob by the wrist of his prosthetic hand. His shabby exterior belied the strength with which he held him firm.

Wothram, Jakob said, and, a moment later, Harland was tossed against the far wall by the golem who had been standing behind him the entire time.

Tell me why, Jakob demanded. Tell me why you sought me out rather than leave this Gods-forsaken swine-hovel.

Harland got to his feet slowly, his breathing laboured after having been forcefully interrupted by the collision with the wooden beam in the centre of the workshop wall.

I need to remain here, he answered vaguely. It is paramount.

And thats why youve been consuming this foul stuff? Jakob replied, lifting the flask in the air, before slamming it into the workstation top and sending shards everywhere.

Harland let out a horrified scream, like he just watched his child murdered before him. Jakob found it repugnant that a supposed Gold-Ranker would be the slave to something like this. He had allowed Veks his euphorics, because the Thief had seemed to be able to handle them with his elevated metabolism, but Jakob abhorred those whose lives revolved around getting their next fix.

A rational part of his mind then kicked-in however, and he considered what good he could accomplish by having a euphorics-fiend on his leash. Though it was arguably a worse idea than trying to make a deal with a Daemon like Guillaume. Even the Undying Daemons betrayal had not been too unexpected, but those whose lives revolved around euphorics were always just one step from total chaos and they tended to build up a tolerance fast, needing more-and-more exotic highs to not devolve into utter madness.

However, it was said that Nharlla was the Primogenitor of Euphorics manifesting in nature, given the Great Ones ability to warp reality and manipulate the minds of any he wished.

These people were innocent!

These people were born to feed those stronger than themselves! Do you not feel how much we have grown in our meteoric journey through these lands!?

The weaker voice was about to respond, but then a sharp rumbling turned Raleighs arm to a crumbled ruin of protruding bones and mangled epidermis.

He at once turned to the source, a lone figure holding aloft a foul-smelling hand.

With a brutal roar, Raleigh sent a flare of scalding wind at the challenger, momentarily halting the aural onslaught that came from the sigils on that unsettling hand and its palm.

YOU BEAR A FOUL STENCH!

I am transcendent, blessed by the almighty Keening One. Your meagre powers are no match for mine.

Raleigh laughed as his right arm healed and became an over-long three-clawed hand that he used to launch himself forward at the figure.

His crystallised epidermis claw rent the air, but the Keenings servant easily side-stepped and swung its foul hand down, taking with it half of Raleighs body. But a True Demon of his strength was not so easily slain, and before the foul man could strike his exposed heart core, he used his overlong clawed hand to launch himself into the air, where, as he flew upwards, he sent a barrage of concentrated blasts of superheated air at the figure, catching him on the side of his face and in the torso, sending him tumbling, unable to immediately retort with his foul sounds and vibrations.

As Raleigh started falling back towards the ground again, spike-tipped tendrils launched from his severed torso and grabbed hold of his lost parts, dragging them to him and instantly repairing his body and making it whole once they connected.

With a loud crash of his enormous weight, Raleigh left a crater where he landed, but no sooner had he turned to face his opponent, when he found himself launched backwards by a wall of vibrating air that even his own mastery of the element could not halt.

He flew like a tumbling comet through the dusk-lit sky, his internals mangled and pulverised into such miniscule fragments that even his supernatural recovery seemed at a loss on how to piece them all back together.

NEXT WE MEET I WILL KILL YOU!!! he screamed with all his might, but he was already so many kilometres from where their battle had taken place that he doubted the foul man would hear him.

Deep within himself, that weaker part he had absorbed seemed to take joy in their defeat.