He closed his eyes, and the labyrinth of magic opened up. Millions upon millions of intersecting lines, like dust motes flittering through multiple shafts of light, became clear. For the first time Velixar understood, truly understood, the nature of the universe, the connection between all things, the web Celestia had woven, built up and over those that had come before, stretching all the way back to the beginning of time itself.
And in the middle of it all stood Karak and Ashhur, faulty vessels of once-powerful cosmic entities, entitled to the power of the universe but restrained, limited and made solid, by singular ideals.
It was Ashhur he focused on, illuminating the filaments of living energy that connected the deity to his multitude of marching corpses, bringing them to the forefront of the web. With the secret revealed, he leapt forth, snagging each of the threads in his own ever-growing web, pumping his influence into them.
The Beast of a Thousand Faces had once commanded an army of the undead, now so would he, even if he had to rip control from a god to do so.
He felt Ashhur’s pain as his energy traveled along the ethereal filaments and surged into the god, contaminating his essence. The thread doubled in width as Velixar and the deity fought over control, but he couldn’t sever Ashhur’s connection. The undead stopped moving, the contradictory orders passed along the invisible threads locking them in place.
They struggled, god and man-turned-god, the tide shifting one way then the other, then rolling back again. Ashhur suffered, the toll of his weakened state made all the more horrific by the constant push and pull. Velixar felt none of that; he was beyond pain. Though he knew his soul was expanding far beyond what should have been possible, he felt nothing but the exhilaration of conflict, of power, the thrill of driving a god to his knees.
Potency continued to pulse into him. The cosmic dust of the universe seeped out of his pores. Velixar expelled more and more of himself, a conduit draining energy from one source and shoving it into another. Ashhur was falling, failing, growing weaker by the moment, but the deity wouldn’t surrender. Velixar grinned, his hair lashing about his face, and poured as much as he possibly could into the spell. The threads binding the undead swelled, became volatile. It was then that Ashhur did relinquish control, and Velixar withdrew in horror. The energy he had hurled in an attempt to thwart the deity instead surged into the undead in a single, violent current. The corpses expanded as the force infused them, their every particle alive with more power than their frail forms could hold. The bodies exploded, filling the afternoon sky with torrents of blood and bits of bone.
The energy snapped back into Velixar, causing him to recoil from its force. His knees buckled, but he didn’t fall. The pain returned. His view of the web crumbled, revealing the battle that still raged, the combatants bathed in the falling blood of the undead. But still he felt vital, he felt strong. And then Ashhur stood from the swarm of battle, himself bathed in blood. The deity beat back the Judges, who attacked him on sight, and then bellowed to the heavens.
“KARAK, SHOW YOURSELF!”
“You will only face the true god of the land if you prove yourself worthy!” Velixar called out. The soldiers who had been guarding him, including the Lord Commander, scattered.
The deity leveled his gaze at him. “Jacob, stand aside. You do not frighten me.”
“I am Velixar now,” he shot back, laughing. “And honestly, my Lord, I should frighten you. Even the gods trembled before the beast.”
There were thousands of people between he and Ashhur, and Velixar again drew on the endless pit of strength, creating a violent wave of dark energy that threw everyone, both friend and foe alike, into the air as if they were scraps of parchment caught by a gale-force wind. When it was done, an expanse of bloodstained cobbles stretched out before him, he standing on one end and Ashhur at the other. Those tossed aside, the ones who were capable enough stood up and began fighting once more.
Ashhur held out his hand, and his ethereal sword grew from nothingness. The god then ran forward, streamers of blood trailing behind him, the glowing blade held above his head, ready to cleave him in two.
Velixar laughed as he reached back inside, tapping into Karak’s might. His power doubled, further pushing against the boundary of his physical form. Ashhur thought him unarmed; the deity didn’t realize that to Velixar, every corpse, every puddle of blood, every bit of bone, was a weapon.
The pools of crimson lining the open space shimmered. Dark, oily vines shot out of them, wrapping around Ashhur’s legs, his waist, his arms, his head. The god was a mere twenty feet away when his momentum stopped, the bloodvines growing more elastic and potent with each word Velixar spat from his mouth. Ashhur grunted, trying to snap the tendrils, but every broken one was replaced by another, and then another, until practically the whole of the deity’s form was wrapped in their pulsating, meaty limbs. Ashhur dropped to his knees. Soldiers skirmishing close by, sensing an opportunity, rushed the struggling god, stabbing at him with swords not strong enough to even scratch Ashhur’s armor. Some jumped on his back, trying to gouge the deity’s neck, but their blades scraped off his shimmering flesh.
Velixar’s fingers worked quickly, twisting into rune after rune. The soldiers attacking Ashhur, all twenty of them, screamed at once, their bodies bulging within their armor as they were lifted into the air. The High Prophet of Karak then flipped his hand over, and the men’s insides came pouring out their mouths. Their bones crunched and pulverized, creating tiny shards that ejected along with the spray of blood and minced organs. When it was done, their armor clanked down to the cobbles, filled with empty husks of flesh. The mess of blood, viscera, and bone began to swirl around the fraught deity, growing faster with each passing second. Velixar laughed and laughed, shoving as much power as he could into the smallest fragments of matter. The rotating cone closed around Ashhur, squeezing him. Smoke rose from the top of the funnel as charged blood particles singed his godly flesh; the hardened bits of bone pricked him like a million tiny needles. Velixar brought his hands together slowly, attempting to crush the deity, but the resistance was great. Ashhur bellowed, his sword slicing upward through the wall of blood and bone that crushed in on him. The spell broke. Once more the power snapped back into Velixar, knocking him back a step.
Ashhur tore the remaining bloodvines off him, scowling as he slowly rose to his feet. Velixar gritted his teeth and cursed, eyes flitting across the arena of war until he caught sight of what he was looking for: a pair of giant bodies covered with bloodstained fur, struggling to stand amid the chaos after being walloped by a god.
“Kayne, Lilah, to me!” Velixar shouted, just as Ashhur let out a cry and brought his sword down with all his might. Velixar raised a globe of shadow and purple fire around himself. When Ashhur’s sword struck the outer edge of the sphere, the blade dug in, sending out geysers of flame that singed the god’s armor. Yet still Ashhur pressed against the sphere, buckling it, cracking it.
Velixar battled against the force of the deity as best he could, driven to his knees beneath that brutal strength. He then saw the two Judges limp out of the mayhem. Velixar squeezed his eyes shut, confident that his shield would hold for a time, and transferred energy from himself to the lions. They shuddered, dropped to their bellies, and then stood up once more. When they took their next steps, neither was limping. Kayne roared and Lilah followed suit.
Ashhur glanced behind him, then back at Velixar, his face a mask of rage that appeared and disappeared between wisps of shadow and jets of flame.