Vol.5 Ch.17.2 – Broken Shackles II

“Y-You killed him,” Carl whimpered as Ares' headless body fell to its knees and his severed head spun through the air to smack a goblin in the face.

“Gods are immortal,” Yume replied coldly, “not invulnerable.” And then she spun around to defend herself from my next attack.

Yes. Unfortunately killing the one who had placed the collar on me didn't actually erase the commands he'd given me. Something to file away for later, certainly, but right now it meant that my body was still doing its best to kill Yume and the others.

Thankfully, the biggest obstacle to taking that collar off was also gone now. Ares couldn't specify his commands anymore and he couldn't step in to stop anyone from freeing me. For now.

Ares was probably already hale and healthy again and would likely be charging toward us momentarily. But at least now we had a window of opportunity as the only one left to stop my girls from freeing me now was Carl. Weasely, cowardly Carl.

I just couldn't take this guy seriously. I knew intellectually that he had become more powerful, likely vastly so, but something in me just balked at the idea of the little shit who couldn't even stab a Dark Lord to death with a legendary weapon being a credible threat. Thankfully, for now I didn't have to. I couldn't attack him unless he was stupid enough to get in my way. I was certain that if he tried to stop me from attacking the girls I would be able to attack him instead.

For a moment I considered focusing my attacks on Alisha in the hopes of getting the idiot to step in and stop me but if he decided that his life was more important than getting to keep her I would be forced to attack the one least likely to hold me off.

And so I had to hope the others would be able to deal with whatever he threw at them while I let Yume effortlessly deflect my blows.

Behind me I could hear the bastard mutter: “I should run. No, Ares will kill me if he finds out I ran away. But is that really worse than getting killed while fighting them? Tailor won't listen to me, either, only to Ares. But they'll be busy trying to free him, maybe I can pick them off one by one? Idiot, they have a fucking goddess on their side. What do I have?” He paused, then said much clearer. “Time. I have time. I don't need to win this, I just need to stall until Ares gets back here.” At that he raised his mace and then said... I had no idea what he said. He spoke syllables I'd never heard a mortal speak before, sounds full of squeaks and mutters and snorts. Only when the goblins all looked up at once did I realize where I'd heard that language before. The fucker had learned how to speak the goblin tongue. I supposed it fit a little weasel like him.

In response the goblins all clutched their weapons and charged at my girls. The horde hadn't taken three steps before Carl called out:

“Oh great Ares, I invoke the miracle of the War Horn you have gifted me!” The deafening sound of a horn rang out across the plaza and all the goblins started moving a little faster, a little surer.

Miracles like this were quite powerful even if they only affected a small number of fighters. With a group of goblins several dozens strong it might even be enough to turn those little shits into a threatening force.

And so that army of goblins crashed into Selene and Athena. To my utter horror I saw Selene actually being rocked back a step by the tidal wave of green little shits. Even worse, there were so many of them that Selene and Athena alone couldn't stem the tide. Anna with both her sapphire wings extended had to join the fray and even then Alisha and Melinoe needed to rush out spell after spell just to hold the goblins off. And that still left Carl unaccounted for.

A blue-gray aura rose up around the bastard and a moment later a hail of force blades snapped into existence behind him and launched itself at Athena. The spell turned the goblin hammering away at Athena's shield into a dozen slices of goblin meat but Carl clearly didn't care. He only cared about the fact that Athena had to yank her shield up to avoid one of the force blades slicing half of her head off, giving the three goblins rushing in behind their fallen brother the opportunity to stab at her calves.

She hissed in pain and swung Aegis through a mighty shield bash that sent the goblins flying but six more were there to take their place.

“Not so smug now,” Carl hissed.

Oh, how I wanted to cave his skull in. Unfortunately I was still busy hacking away at Yume's blade. I had briefly entertained the idea of using a flame swathe on Yume only to have her jump away at the last moment but unfortunately the group of goblins was far too close to my girls and so sending flames at them would likely be detrimental.

Yume had clearly realized it as well. There were no more games to be played, no malicious compliance left. The only way out of this mess would be to free me. And so she dropped her weapon.

The compulsion to kill had lain more or less dormant in my mind since I had been so obediently following it and attacking her but with Yume completely defenseless it howled at me to kill her. I slammed my will against it on pure instinct. Why would she throw her weapon away? Had she misunderstood everything after all? It made no sense. But as I fought against the compulsion it constricted around my limbs, forcing me to move against my will.

I charged at Yume, dropping my weapon as well so I could wrap my hands around her slender throat. Apparently the slow kill Ares wanted me to inflict upon her was to strangle her to death. It was horrible, squeezing the life out of her while she stared into my eyes, a look of betrayal on her face. Except I couldn't actually feel her throat under my hands.

Both my mind and the compulsion forcing my body into action were frozen in confusion until the Yume I'd been strangling burst into motes of light blue light. In that exact moment a small hand tangled in my hair to yank my head back as a sharp piece of metal sank into my neck, piercing the collar and just breaking the skin of my throat.

A tingling sensation discharged from the blade into my skin as the dispelling stiletto banished the compulsion. Before the magic of the collar could reassert itself Yume ripped the thing off my throat, finally freeing me.

**

I took a deep breath, the first truly free breath I'd taken since Ares had put that fucking collar on me.

“Thank you,” I said gravely.

“You're welcome,” she said, nuzzling into me.

I knew we needed to help the others but I just took a moment first to hug her to me, squeezing her like I never wanted to let her go. Her tails wagged gently as she melted into my touch.

“You know why I went after you, right?” I asked her gently.

“You knew I was the one most likely to hold you off,” she said with absolute confidence.

I breathed a sigh of relief, glad to see she'd understood. I had been terrified that she would think I considered her more disposable than the others.

I kissed her forehead, then pulled us both up. “Let's take these bastards down before Ares gets back.”

“Yes, let's,” she said. “How do you want to do this?”

I considered for a moment. I wanted to get rid of Carl as soon as possible as I didn't want to give him more time to cast miracles or spells. But at the same time, this was personal.

“Can you carve a path for Selene?” I asked Yume. “I need her and Alisha.”

“Of course,” Yume said and picked up her sword before dashing off.

“Anna, Yume, Athena, Melinoe, take down the goblins,” I called out, my voice ringing across the battlefield. “Alisha, Selene, to me!”

There was a moment of pause as everyone realized that Yume had managed to free me before the fighting resumed again. Yume glowed with white mist as she charged towards the goblins and every one of her carefully placed swings blossomed into a dozen slashes that carved goblins apart wherever she went. Soon Alisha and Selene joined me behind the goblin lines, Selene covered in blackish blood and Alisha... The butterfly wings of her aura were so dense they looked almost tangible, the winds around her so strong they made her clothes and her hair flutter. She was very nearly floating, her sandals not even leaving trails in the goblin blood strewn around the plaza.

“I'm so glad you're free,” Alisha whispered.

“Yeah,” Selene said.

“Glad to be back,” I said, then turned towards Carl. “Now let's take care of this bastard.”

“Why did you want me along?” Selene asked as we advanced on him. “Alisha I get, you two have unfinished business with him, but why me?”

“We need someone who is good at defending,” I said. “So it was you or Athena.”

“Then thank you for choosing me,” she said.

“You,” Carl growled as we approached.

“Sure you don't want to run?” I asked. “Ares isn't here yet. And by the time I'm done with him he won't be in any position to come after you.”

“You would let me go after all this?” he asked, genuinely shocked.

“I would give you a head start,” I said. “I don't much care about the how or why but you did take up with Outsiders. I will take you down but you're really not my highest priority right now.”

“Well maybe you shouldn't underestimate me,” he hissed and once again his aura flared up. It looked like gray-blue fire rising up behind him but now that I had a good look at it it did look quite a bit darker than normal force magic. Was this the Outsider taint or was there something else to this bastard's magic?

He raised his hand and in response a dozen force blades snapped into existence behind him. Before he could loose them at us I threw a dispelling stiletto at him. The knife hit him right in the palm, breaking his concentration and disrupting his spell just on the off-chance that a sharp piece of metal sinking three inches into his flesh hadn't made him drop the spell. His magic was actually quite powerful. Where had this been back when he'd been a pathetic Chosen One?

He yanked the knife out of his palm and hissed at the pain, then glared at me as he summoned another spell. Once again I threw a stiletto at him but this time the knife caught on an almost invisible wall of force.

Force magic was nasty stuff. Just like how illusion magic could mask its own mana signature to be harder to detect, so could force magic send out invisible spells. It took a lot of practice to make happen but evidently Carl was good enough at it. Even worse, while a dispelling stiletto could cancel a spell, it did still end up affected by the force projected by the spell. In this case the wall of force had likely been rushing toward us and while the knife had canceled it out, it had still been stopped cold by the spell, clattering to the ground several feet away from hitting him.

Force magic was second only to Qi Projection in its ability to carve things apart with zero effort. Magic protection could defend against it but even that was iffy. Alisha could probably stop a few of this bastard's spells cold but Selene and I would have to rely on just not getting hit.

We gave each other a nod, then charged at him at once, relying on dividing his attention. Another hail of force blades rushed toward us except when I tried to roll out of the way something snagged at my ankle. As I twisted to keep myself from slamming face-first into the marble floor I saw a tendril of shadow wrapped around my ankle. The bastard had a shadow affinity as well, that's why his magic looked too dark.

Before I could think up a way to avoid the force blades Alisha's barrier miracle snapped into place in front of me, a translucent pane of what very distinctly wasn't glass keeping the force blades away from me. I looked back and gave Alisha a nod of appreciation before carving through the tendril of shadow with Helios Edge and getting back up.

“He has a shadow affinity,” I called out. “Watch out for that!”

“Not again,” Selene groaned. “Rognir was bad enough.”

“I doubt this guy is at the same level as him,” I called back, mostly to reassure myself. If Carl had master-level shadow magic on top of his force magic then this would be really bad.

Once again I charged at Carl and once again he held me off with shadow and force magic. So approaching him was impossible and attacking him at range wasn't possible either if he knew it was coming. Then that left one easy avenue.

I summoned forth my Qi, feeding it into Helios Edge, making the blade glow white with my power, and when he raised his hand to summon another hail of force blades I swung my blade down in a diagonal slash. He didn't even attempt to dodge, seeing as I was a dozen yards away from him, but range didn't really matter with a Qi Projection.

The slash I had placed in the middle of nowhere appeared on his arm, severing his hand before he could launch his spell at us. The limb spun through the air, launched away by the force of my projected slash.

The moment seemed to stretch out forever as I realized with growing horror that no blood spewed from Carl's wound. And then a massive red centipede burst from the stump of his arm, snatched the severed hand out of the air and then retracted, pulling the limb back into place, four little bug legs sticking out of the wrist the only indication that his limb had been removed at all.