Sacrifice Mage-Chapter 11: Scarthrall

Much as I’d have liked to spend more time planning out how to beat the two whatever-they-were approaching us, the reality of the situation was a lot harsher.
The familiarity I had felt was becoming clearer. They gave off similar vibes as the vampires I had seen so far, first from Hamsik and then that arrogant noble at the temple. The same red eyes, the same cruel fangs, the same moonlike paleness. Except, these two were clearly not Scarseekers, as Hamsik had called his race.
Curiously, they reminded me of zombies too. Their skin was pale, sure, but blotchy and pockmarked as well. One was sporting a livid wound around his neck, while another had a gory, glistening hole near his belly. They weren’t oozing blood though.
And unlike the Scarseekers I had seen so far, who had presented visions of elegance and refinement, these two were basically street thugs.
I wanted to ask Aurier if he had more information about what these two were. There was no time, though. They were almost upon us. My heart had started thudding. Adrenaline was making me feel jittery. And worst of all, fear was making itself known. The rotted plank in my hand was doing nothing to make me feel readier or safer.
Turn and run
, a small part of me advised. Their sharp fangs, their murderous stares, the obvious sense of power…
The glowing red threads I could see running through their eyes…
And
that
was why I was focusing on how to win. On how to beat them. If I knew I could win, I had no reason to be afraid.
“I’ll take the one on the left,” the taller of the two said, eyeing me like I was a pan-seared prime ribeye. “You take the one on the right.”
His companion licked his lips. “Aw, you taking the fresh one?”
“Just kill ‘em.”
“I think they’re Scarthralls,” Aurier hissed quickly. “Don’t let them bite you!”
They laughed at Aurier’s warning, then split apart and attacked.
I had no room to worry about Aurier. My eyes were focused entirely on the Scarthrall rushing me down. Fast.
Too
fast. I attempted to bring up the jagged end of my broken plank, but he reached me before it was even halfway up. His hands shot up quick enough to make pro boxers weep, and I found myself achieving liftoff.
Pain bloomed all over me. There were the points on my chest where I had been struck. Then the spots where my back crashed back against the ground. I gasped against the shock, and instinctively kicked the ground, maintaining my rolling motion.
A rush of air and a clack of sharp teeth indicated where the Scarthrall had missed me by inches.
I did my best to get back on my wobbly feet. My whole body was shaking. The Scarthrall was whirling to face me, but I was at a right angle to him. At just the right orientation for a kick to feel like the perfect move. I just had to—
It came in too fast. I wasn’t prepared at all for that kind of speed. My opponent’s leg whooshed upwards. Forget using my Aspect, I just barely got my arm up in time to block.
With a grunt of pain, I went tumbling again. What sheer
power
. Definitely well above my low Iron ranks.
I hadn’t fallen to my back or had to roll again. My feet just scrabbled on the ground as the force shoved me backwards, and I did go down to my knees. But it was progress. Meagre, but there it was. I was getting a better feel for the fight. My heart had slowed just a bit from thumping hard enough to burst free from my ribcage.
“Stay down,” the Scarthrall said, baring his fangs at me. “You tried hard enough. Your meat’s well and flushed by now. Enough for a tasty bite. Any more struggling, and your blood’s going to turn a little
too
tangy.”
I got back upright again, legs shaking less than before. All this time, I had still managed to keep a hold on my plank. I aimed the jagged end at my enemy. “Stay down? Why, cause you’re too weak to kill me unless I stop resisting?”
He snarled. Then, just as he was about to charge, I rushed in too.
At seeing my surprising choice to attack, he halted. His grin bared every single one of his fangs. I roared as I rushed in like a jousting lancer, points of the plank aimed straight for his heart like a stake.
He caught it. No surprise. His Agility had to be terribly high as well.
But it didn’t stop my momentum. Stupid bastard had fallen for the feint. I grinned, letting go as soon as the plank was tight in his grip, diving straight for his feet. My momentum carried me past him, but not before my fingers brushed across his leg.
And poured a hefty chunk of my deep purple threads into the ragged shoe.
That was one of the limits of my Gravity Aspect I hadn’t actualized in my head yet, even though I
knew
it. I needed direct contact to make it work on things other than myself.
The Scarthrall whirled around to face me as I got back up behind him, ignoring the cage of dark energy weighing down his shoe. He threw away the plank. The next instant, he was lunging at me, teeth bared and hands outstretched. He stumbled well before he reached me. His eyes went wide. “
What?
”
“Idiot,” I said, before taking advantage of the stumble.
I punched the Scarthrall. Moments before I connected, I infused another heavy chunk of Gravity into my fist. It felt less like a right hook and more like smacking somebody with a bowling ball.
With a pained yowl, the Scarthrall went down. A few satisfying teeth and blood droplets went flying at the contact.
The momentum of my weighted fist dragged me forward too. I shut off the threads quickly, regaining my balance fast.
Much as I’d have liked to stomp the guy, I got over my instincts. The more optimal thing was briefly nudging him all over with my foot before he could fully recover. More threads leapt from my foot at the contact, wrapping over his clothes and his other shoe, turning dark and caging him in with their weighted locks.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. the violation.
I picked up my makeshift weapon, breathing hard as I staggered back. The first hints of mana exhaustion was tugging at my soul, reminding me of the hollowness in my chest.
“What—” The Scarthrall struggled, trying to rise but obviously weighed down by everything he wore. I had applied a
lot
of my threads. “What did you
do?
”
I ignored him. About twenty feet away, Aurier was still fighting against the other Scarthrall. His arms were once again wrapped in those burning orange threads. He had his hammer out too, the head glowing with the same mana.
“Get the girls!” he said as I was about to rush over and help. Even in the middle of warding his opponent off with wide swings of his hammer, he had noted my stance. “I’ll be fine.”
I nodded. It was a fair suggestion. Aurier was keeping up against his opponent, and looked less beat up than I had been. He’d survive. So I rushed over to the shack I had seen the girl in.
Wait, no. Aurier had said
girls
. Was that serpent person
another
little girl too?
They hauled open the door as soon as I was close.
“We need to leave,” I said. Briefly, I noted that both the woman’s daughter and the lizard girl both looked alright. That was a relief. “Come on!”
“Right.” The serpent person with light green scales grabbed the little girl’s hand. She did indeed sound like a girl, her sibilant voice young and feminine. “Celia, let’s go!”
I turned and led the way back. My Aspect wasn’t going to keep the first Scarthrall down for long. Just like with the carriage, it would fade in a minute or two, and then we’d be back where we started. We had to leave.
Now
.
“Aurier!” I shouted as I began running, making sure the girls were close behind. “We need to go.
Now
.”
“Go?” the second Scarthrall hissed. “Not before you leave some blood for us!”
The other one had managed to rip apart his dirty shirt, revealing pockmarked flesh studded with gory little wounds. “You’re not going
anywhere!
” It sounded weird the way he said it, and I noticed that his jaw almost looked dislocated from my punch. Huh. Not a lot of Vitality, then?
His companion got more aggressive against Aurier. He began ignoring the hammer swings, just straight up tanking the way his flesh caved in while trying to claw Aurier and chomp down on him.
“Just go!” Aurier shouted. “I’ll be fine.”
I nodded at the girls. “You heard him. Keep going.” I focused on the serpent-girl. She was definitely older than the human girl, going by her size, unless serpent-people had different growth rates or something. “You know the way back, right?”
She nodded. “We’ll be fine.”
“Good. Get going. We’ll meet you in the square.”
She rushed off, more or less hauling her younger charge along behind her. “I’ll call for help!”
When I turned, Aurier had received a few blows. His robes were torn and his upper arm was bleeding. None of them looked like bite wounds though, so it ought to be fine.
I didn’t rush straight to his side. First, I made a pit-stop at
my
opponent.
He growled as I approached, licking his lips like he couldn’t wait to rip a chunk of bloody flesh off me. I didn’t let him. Instead, I experimented. As soon as I was close enough, I reached forward with the plank and drove my threads through the wood while also touching its jagged end to his trousers and boots.
My little plan worked. Deep purple strands of magical power drove through my makeshift weapon to dive into my real target—the Scarthrall. He yelled in protest as I weighed down his boots and clothes even more.
“Stay put,” I said.
Considering I didn’t want to see a naked vampire-zombie—he had started trying to tear off his trousers to free himself—I got going.
Unlike Aurier, the other Scarthrall was too busy trying to sink his teeth into his opponent to notice much about his compatriot. This left me free to approach from the side. Problem was, he was moving too much, too wildly. I had seen what happened against my opponent. If I just approached blindly, I’d get flung back.
Then Aurier created just the opening I needed. He feinted too. It would have made me smile if the situation wasn’t sending my heart into overdrive.
He swung his hammer but dropped it at the last second. It struck the ground with a metallic thump. But his hands kept on flying and he grabbed the Scarthrall around the neck. It wasn’t just the hammer. Aurier had basically flung his whole body at his enemy. With a cry, both men went down, Aurier falling on top of the Scarthrall.
I ignored the way the Scarthrall’s hands dug into Aurier’s arm hard enough to crush it, turning the flesh purple and breaking the skin to draw blood
just
by squeezing. I ignored the way the asshole was trying to do the same to Aurier’s face, which he was desperately trying to avoid.
All I focused on was quickly doing the same to this Scarthrall as I had done to the other. Threads of purple power burgeoned out at every touch, weighing this one’s clothes down too, making the emptiness slowly start turning into a chasm. But I didn’t stop there. Weighed down though he was, he still hadn’t let go of Aurier.
So, I pulled up the fallen hammer. I cursed. It was already pretty heavy. Just how high was Aurier’s Power?
“Aurier!” I warned.
He looked up just in time to see me holding the hammer over the Scarthrall’s head. I forced enough Gravity into it to take it to the point where I couldn’t hold it any longer. The emptiness was yawning within me. I let go.
The hammer
crushed
the Scarthrall’s head.
His whole body twitched violently as bits of bone, teeth, flesh, blood and brain matter went splattering in every direction, staining Aurier’s torn robes. I was certain I saw his eyeballs pop out of his skull.
The other Scarthrall screeched out at seeing his companion’s motionless state.
“Come o—” Burning bile rushed up my gullet. My face felt like it was on fire.
Somehow, someway, I managed to grab a shocked Aurier under the arms and haul him up with me.
We got moving as fast as we could. I spat the taste of vomit out of my mouth. My stomach was rebelling horrifically, but I needed to keep it together until we were safe. I had just killed a guy. No, they were more or less monsters. But still. I had
crushed
his entire—
Aurier cursed. “He’s coming back. Go.
Go!
”
I looked back. Terrible mistake. This time, I couldn’t hold back from vomiting out the contents of my guts. I was just glad that I had Sacrificed my breakfast instead of eating it.
The Scarthrall’s head was regenerating. Flesh was reforming, blood vessels and nerves reknitting together, bones and teeth growing back in their usual place. The sight of watching the whites of his eyes pool and reform in his orbits was probably going to haunt my nightmares for days to come. His body was twitching. Struggling against the binds of my Gravity.
“Shit,” I said, hating the taste of bile in my mouth.
Aurier and I managed to escape. I didn’t feel like I had won. No way was I going to call that a victory. Even if the Weave chose to reward me for it.
[ Rank Up!
Your Power and Vitality Attributes have risen by one Rank.
Your Gravity Aspect has risen by one Rank.
Your Path of the Newborn Star has risen by one Rank.
Power
: Iron III
Vitality
: Iron II
Gravity
: Iron IV
Path of the Newborn Star
: Iron III
]
Burgeoning energy scoured its way through my body. I could feel my muscles tightening just a bit, my skin growing strangely solider as a sensation of greater strength settled like a mantle of subdued confidence. I hardly felt it, too focused on just getting out of there.
We weren’t chased. I was able to make good time along with Aurier back to more populated areas, and I actually felt safe. Terrible too, like I needed a vacation to Bermuda along with my therapist, but not in danger. My hands and legs were still shaking, and it was hard to keep my whole body from trembling.
“What the hell was all that, Aurier?” I asked. What I really needed was some water to wash the taste out of my mouth.
Aurier just shook his head, still looking shocked at the ultraviolent end of our fight. “Let’s go make sure those girls are alright…”
I supposed we could do that. Personally, I was just glad that being in a more populated area was enough to ward off the Scarthralls. It didn’t take too long to find them. The girls were there, as well as the woman who had sent us off on this quest.
There were also a small group of people in uniform. Ah, those had to be the city guards. One look, and they came straight for me and Aurier.