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Caefern coughs. “Again, we could just go over the ravine.”

  The knights all glance at Caefern with distrust.

  “He challenged us,” Redemption says.

  Glory sighs. “It’s really too late now. If we cross over he’ll just hit us from behind when we’re not expecting it… the duel’s started.”

  Order nods. “We have no choice but to fight… At least, us knights.”

  Redemption squints an eye. “What’s going on in that head of yours, Ranalie?”

  “…Nias,” Order addresses softly.

  “Yes, masteress?”

  “You can coalesce a portal from most anywhere you have a semblancing to, right?” Order asks, referring to the understanding of a location’s 'feeling' rather than its simple physical traits.

  Nias nods, squinting an eye with uncertainty. “…Yes.”

  “Could you…hrm, could you open a portal to a side-realm?” she asks, much to Redemption’s chagrin and to the horror of the rest of the group. Like Negative Space or Subspace, “side-realms” are usually considered the very last places one would want to open up. They coincide perfectly with the common mortal plane, so it’s not exactly something the O.E.L. can block travel from— though finding someone who would actually want to do such a thing would be a one in a million chance.

  Steadily, Nias’ expression sours in terrified awe. “That would be… technically possible, ma’am, but I’d need a referencing scroll to actually… oh no,” he mutters as Order hands him a very, very dangerous-looking scroll from one of her in-armor compartments. The parchment is black with tormented years of furious ink, taking on a heart of its own in its venomous desire to be used for destruction.

  Other than Nias, Redemption’s the only one that recognizes any of the runes. “Those runes lead right to the incorporeal. You want him to…”

  “I won’t have time to open the gate by myself, and I don’t aim to disappoint him.”

  Nias nods. “You understand, ma’am, if any of you are caught up in the opening of the portal that-”

  “Yes, but the longer it takes to fight him the more it will tilt in his favor. Chaos operates entirely on his belief. When he doesn’t care, he’s weak— but we’ve already poured enough oil on the fire; we’ll be getting him with the intent to kill.”

  Nias nods coldly as he takes from her the furious scroll of immeasurable arcanity. “Very well ma’am.”

  “That leaves you, Caefern, to keep watch.”

  Caefern gives a salute. “As you wish, knightess.”

  “Alright. Let’s go.” Order leaps into the abyss, with Redemption and Glory fast behind her. Nias gets right to coalescing the portal as Caefern just leans against a nearby tree.

  “Well, this’ll be fun,” Caefern says.

  —

  Descending into the purplish-red hues of the forge-lights below, Order empties herself completely, as Redemption has also trained himself to do. The only one not entirely on task is Glory— who, being somewhat more considerate at the present time, is holding fast to his reservations. Order pulls down her visor, becoming fully-noble, as the common folk of the Western Kingdoms would see her.

  They slam into the ground, their enchanted weights taking the fall with the grace of a bird to a branch. All around them, the necromancers are working away tirelessly, constructing new bodies and tools and weapons from flesh and bone and iron.

  The forge master, seven times larger than the three of them combined, slings up its mountainous hammer over its shoulder as the entire workshop runs to an eerie stop. All stolen, empty eyes turn to the three knights, with Order standing defiantly at the forefront.

  “HOW DARE YOU INSULT US WITH YOUR-”

  “Our qualm is not with you, animal,” Order says, her cool, relaxed tone silencing the necromancer out of fear alone. “Where is Chaos?”

  The forgemaster laughs along with its massive retinue of thousands upon thousands of necromancers, most strewn along the chasm walls in elevated furnace-complexes carved out from the sides. “WE WOULD KNOW IF HE WERE HERE, PARTS,” it claims with a sudden rise of confidence. “I’LL SEE YOU YOUR EYES AND TEETH TO LEAVE.”

  The fully concealed, fully masked Order tilts her head a bit to the side. “You will not fight with us. Amalgamations do not have the right to lay hands on completed beings.”

  “MIGHT MAKES RIGHT, PARTS, DIE!” The forgemaster screeches with a chorus of stolen voiceboxes as it swings down its hammer at Order.

  In a blink and a flash, Monument’s gilded entirety has passed through the enormous necromancer and departed its viscera to all sides of the forge. The blast of its demise is so great its parts smash through the crowds of workers, crushing dozens with each limb.

  There’s another pause as the necromancers all stare at the Chaos Slayer— and like insects, they scatter to their holes. With an audience of thousands, Order, Redemption, and Glory form up to spot the High Overlord.

  “Chaos, show yourself!” Order calls, her eyes flushing an enthused orange under her helmet.

  “You understand,” Chaos starts, his voice from far off. “That showing myself right now would not be to my benefit.”

  Glory and Redemption double take as they both have trouble believing Chaos would say something so goofy in the midst of what will obviously be an epically-fatal battle.

  Order sighs. “Yeah, duh, but then why would you be responding to me?”

  There’s a pause as Order gives the hand-gesture telling the trio to stay together as she leads the search for the High Overlord.

  “Well… it wouldn’t be polite, you understand.”

  “Killing people isn’t polite,” Redemption calls out.

  Chaos scoffs from somewhere along the canyon workshops, from the left-side wall. “I would be inclined to agree. So let’s not fight.”

  Redemption scoffs as Order sighs again. “We’ve been over this, you idiot. Get down here so we can get this over with.” She’s certain he’s up along the middle. She signals the others to come up with her, all three casting gravity-defying magic to walk directly up the wall on the opposite side. So long as they keep at least fifty meters of distance before Chaos moves in, she should be able to react in time. For most creatures, fifty meters is a huge amount of distance— but for Chaos it’s less than a second.

  “You three… tsk tsk tsk…. You really do not have any hope. First you attack my tower, punish my poor minions, and now you have the nerve to chase me down through all of this mess, just because it’s in your precious code?”

  “Obviously,” Redemption says. “If it weren’t for the Knight’s Code, we’d be nothing. I’m not interested in rhetoric from a mass murderer— but please, keep talking.”

  Chaos laughs, filling the chasm with the horrific, eerie sound of his voice. “How very ironic. I wonder, sometimes if you even have the strength of mete to look upon the same murderous countries you protect… but there’s no need for that anymore. You’ve come too far to survive, Daniel.”

  The three are silent as they near the altitude of his voice.

  “You righteous, holy crusader— you paragon of righteousness. I’ll show you what you’re so afraid of- that dark magic that hides around corners and is vagued out in those children’s stories.”

  The knights are only seconds away.

  “Let me show you, Daniel, allow me to take you on this trip down to reality— as with your final breaths you'll never once consider that I’m the one in the right, that I am the savior of more lives than you could ever appreciate with that minuscule neutron of a brain you have in that thick skull of yours… I have made my decision.”

  “And what’s that, Chaos?” Glory asks.

  “Have you ever heard the phrase: ‘the wise eagle keeps his talons hidden’?”

  There’s a pause as they rear up with their weapons ready, right at the pitch angle of looking into Chaos’ little cove. Order can feel him nearby, like an arcane breath on her neck. “I have,” Redemption says with a hearty tone, “what of it?”r />
  “I have decided that you are worth showing my talons to, you decrepit, hypocritical fools. I shall offer you a glimpse into my world. Behold, your undoing!”

  Just as they lift up to the corner and look into the workshop carved out of the stone wall, all ready and turned to the point, they see none other than Scout Minion— her mouth open wide and projecting Chaos’ voice through her own chords using antennae communication.

  All three look on in awe, and think to look behind themselves just a second too late.

  “En garde,” Chaos speaks gently from the workshop on the opposite wall - directly behind them and over Order’s plated neck.

  As they all turn, Chaos seizes out from behind them. Ignoring their dozens of protective enchantments like the rules of a children’s game, he smashes entirely through Glory’s chest with his free hand while simultaneously cutting through Redemption’s side. The three plummet down just as Order slashes Monument a glance too late at Chaos’ tall, angular majesty.

  Using what Redemption could only assume is weight-reduction magic, the grinning killer gentleman Chaos stops mid air and changes his trajectory without even an utterance; the tales are true— and even Redemption, the Lord Knight Captain of the Royal Knights, didn’t know: He can really perform wordless magic.

  The next moment is filled with confused, furious reactions from both Order and Redemption, but Glory just draws his bow on reflex — he has accepted his doom.

  As Chaos starts and stops again mid-air, Glory is pulled with him, having laid grip to his arm. At once, the sheer force of velocity tears Glory from Chaos’ sharp limb and sends the knight reeling down into the bottom of the chasm where Redemption had gone. Chaos, his large round eyes now small and isolated with violent bliss, looks up to Order as he soars back to the chasm wall like a fallen leaf. Seven thousand years, and still she’s not used to his movements— so gentle, yet so infinitely capable of force. Through all this time, she’s settled on the descriptor of “infinitely stylish” to describe his way of fighting, that overblown, curling dance that takes place in the blink of an eye to all but the most perceptive.

  She leaps down with Monument ready to arc, and cuts with the might to destroy a boulder. Without even a blink of time, Chaos edges to the side, running along the wall as if it were flat ground. He gallops into her side, planting the Kingdom Slayer just inches from her breast as she fields Monument into its path, just in time to absorb the impact.

  “En garde, you child-killing fucker!” she says simply, her voice entirely unshaken.

  Chaos grins as the two force into one another, forming an almost romantic tenderness to their nearness. “Always so unafraid, dear lady,” Chaos says pushing back with everything he has— an admirable match to Order’s hysterically-enhanced magical strength. Like a mountain leaning into a castle, he’s steadily pushing her off balance. “You truly are the only one that has the right to speak my name with insult,” he adds with a tone of frank admiration.

  Order charges out her mana reserves as she struggles to keep her hold. “Then hark, you animal. I’m going to put you in the ground one way or another. I’ll never forgive you for the damage you’ve done to me or my people.”

  “Still bitter about me killing your husband, mmm?” Chaos asks with a squinting, insane look, only mounting further in its loose desire for violence upon Order’s petite frame.

  She seethes for breath. “That was too long ago. You are more like my husband than any man I’ve known, and I hate you!”

  His antennae fold back. “Why, how dare you! Insinuating we are equals!”

  “Never,” she pushes further in, exhausting a whole mage-squad’s worth of mana to stay at odds with him. “Yes, what nerve have I, to dare insult the inherent God-Incarnate?”

  Chaos glances away awkwardly with stars in his ethereal eyes, as if they were having tea in a cafe and she had just said something flattering. “W-well I would not dare go that far. Unlike you foolish humans, I do have some semblance of humility. I swear to you, I do not create worlds— but I do own them by right.”

  Order seethes again, Chaos’ stellar weight capable of crushing her with just a single lapse of concentration on her part. “That was sarcasm.”

  “O-oh! No!” His antennae arc down again in deflation. “I was so honored….”

  “What?”

  “I almost thought you felt the same way about me that I did you.”

  Order sputters in disgust. “Y-fh...f…. No! King’s Holy Grave, no!”

  Chaos peers on through her helmet with his powerful, all-seeing eyes. “Ahh, but you are blushing, you poor little maid! You go to such great lengths to hide it, but it’s plain as the daytime to me!” He exclaims this just as he looks back down the chasm; Glory is fully out for the count, but Redemption is rushing back up. “I suppose babysitting for all these little boys and their sticks is a bother to you; I will admit you have a heavy responsibility to push up humanity’s boulder.”

  She can’t deny it. The two barely speak for obvious reasons, so these fights are both an event she dreads and looks forward to with full anticipation. “They’re perfectly capable against ninety-nine percent of foes. Fishing for compliments now, are we?”

  Chaos grins. “I really like what you’ve done with your hair. The short wasn’t really to your credit, but the long covered your cute little neck.”

  At once, she can feel an immense strength welling up inside of him— here it comes, the “shift”, the completeness.

  “The bun seems to be a good balance. Practical, too.”

  Order pushes back with everything she has, but it’s not enough. “I don’t much care for your opinion.”

  He presses his head forward, reaching past Monument’s blade to touch foreheads with her helmet mask. “I do not much care for your friends. Let me show you,” he says the moment she feels him tear away.

  “Don’t you d-” She can’t finish her words in time before Chaos, without any respect to common gravity, arches back and pushes off of her pelvis as he reaches under their blades in another risky, confident move.

  He slams into Redemption in a flash, the sound of a train impacting a shipment of metal shearing through the chasm as the two meet blades. Instantly they impact back into the bottom of the chasm.

  Daniel takes a deep breath to fill his lungs for screaming. “YOU INSIGNIFICANT DEMON FROM HELL! WATCH AND CRAWL AS I SEND Y-” but Chaos does not offer Redemption the same grace as Order and folds his blacker than pitch elbow right into his face. Even though the tallness of his frame wouldn’t suggest it, Chaos is ludicrously strong in all athletic feats— especially the striking of idiot knights.

  Redemption— thousands of years of successful missions, crusades, and expeditions under his belt, his personal halls filled with hundreds of trophies of conquest and justice and saved masses— is smashed like an adolescent in his first sparring match against the master at arms. The first hit causes a sharp inhale, the second hit a blubbering spit of blood and saliva, and the last an utterance from consciousness, knocking him clean out via the comparable force of a building landing on his face.

  Chaos raises his bloodied fist back to the ready, Redemption’s sanguine running freely off his sleek, frictionless hand. He looks back up to Order, standing clear as she waits for his move.

  “Satisfied?” Order calls down as she leans in at the ready to either dodge along the wall or drop off entirely.

  Chaos cackles in his deep, dramatic fashion— a sound that chills her blood cold. “Not quite so, you hypocritical, depraved parasite!”

  For the first time, Order flinches. “…How,” she says in a normal tone of voice. She knows well he could hear her speak at any volume.

  “I see everything with these eyes of mine. I have known it for so long, waiting for the perfect time… oh, well rats. I suppose I was actually planning on mentioning it some other time, but now is good enough! Haha!”

  She snaps her head away from Chaos to check Glory and Redemption — thank every
god that they’re unconscious. There’s absolutely no room for playing anymore. She’s going to push into him and break him upon the rocks.

  “You’ve known… for all this time.”

  “Yes! From the very first day! So answer me with action. Be gone from this place. Leave! Take your men and go! Take them from my towers— you have no right to be there where my family treads! Let my minions be in peace! I shall slay Oa— and you, you little creature, may take what is precious to you. Redemption can take the credit, Glory may return to his family, and you… you my little coquette, my little secret-holder, you may go away knowing that I shall not reveal your truth!”

  Order’s blood surges in fury and disgust. She seethes in air again as she readies for movement. “I have my duty. You are my prey. Besides… you have too much honor.”

  Chaos laughs. “Rather, they are your prey. So be it. I will do their job and destroy you, as is the proper fate of a creature of your nature.”

  She edges into an offensive stance. “I’d like to see you try.”

  “Then I suppose we’ll both be going with our best foot forward, eh?”

  The two match gazes a moment more in a dreary, flooded silence, and in a blink they are upon each other once again — another legendary battle that changes the landscape all around them with might and magic unseen by all the realms. For once in the chasm-forge’s history, the brightest lights are not from the furnaces, but from the clashing heraldic metals of two great warriors— wrapped in the blooming sparks of their violence.

  Chapter Ten: The Animal Pen

  “So… we need to ask them?” Aoline asks, folding a white bang behind her ear as the four near the city’s gates.

  Love nods. “Mhmm. If our overlord can’t spot it, then we’ll need help.”

  Dark Arts minion smiles in her sweet, sort of creepy way. “He’s usually pretty good at parsing out magic frequencies, so for the aura to be even past his sight is quite exceptional.”

  “Ahh,” Aoline mutters, “gotcha. I guess this is our best bet for finding Oa, then.”

  The four step in to the short, small gates of the large walled city.