The Lord of the Rust Mountains: Secundus
Contents
Prologue
The room featured stonework walls, a small wooden chair and writing desk, and even a comfy‐looking bed set into an alcove in the wall. On the shelves and writing desk were everyday items, books, and countless memos that I’d left behind when I set off on my journey. It was my room in that beloved temple on the hill.
I had returned to that city of the dead.
A peaceful homecoming — if only that were the case. The number of demon- related incidents was climbing every day as the dragon howled in the Rust Mountains to the west. The god of undeath’s Herald had prophesied that I would die if I took on the dragon, but after a lot of deliberation, I decided to challenge it anyway for the sake of my oath, which I didn’t want to break. Of course, I had no intention of dying in vain. I had even put together a strategy. We would go up the river to slip by the demons and launch a surprise attack from the western side of the Rust Mountains. That required going through the city of the dead, and it was for that reason that I’d returned home. It was a small detour before the battle for our lives.
Gus had shown everyone to individual rooms around the temple, and for now we were taking a short moment of respite. The room given to me was this one, which I fondly remembered from my years as a boy. I traced a finger across the cold stone walls. It brought back several memories.
The three undead couldn’t tell much of a difference between hot and cold days, but for me, being a living human, the cold winter night had been pretty harsh. Gus grudgingly arranged for a heated stone for me to keep me warm. As I waited by the fireplace for the stone to warm up, Blood told one of his epic tales, with exaggerated gestures of his hands and body. Mary listened to Blood’s story with a smile on her face as she sewed, occasionally saying one or two words to keep him talking.
It was a dazzling, happy past. And though it was gone and Blood and Mary were no longer here, I was sure that didn’t take away from those days in any way. My happy past continued to shine. And probably, even after Gus disappeared, and even after I died, it would still continue shining forever, like beautiful sand settling at the bottom of the flowing river of time.
My face cracked into a smile. Returning to my home may have made me a little sentimental.
Then, there was a knock on the door to my room. The old door creaked as Menel poked his head around it. “Hey. Coming in.” He peered around the room with interest. “This your room?”
“Yeah.”
Menel hummed vaguely as he looked around. “Small.”
“It was a pretty good fit for me when I was a kid, though.”
These were originally mere sleeping rooms for priests who served the temple.
They had a simple construction with almost no space to store anything unnecessary.
“Hey, Will, that old Gus guy, he’s pretty awesome.”
“I thought you were going to say he’s cruder than you imagined, or something.”
“Well, uh. He is. He is, but, uh…” Menel went quiet for a moment while he chose his words, and then spoke in a whisper. “When he was showing me to my room, I felt like he could see right into my mind.”
I nodded.
Many of this world’s greatest and most renowned sorcerers didn’t speak much. Telling lies weakened the power of the Words of Creation. Blunt and empty Words that had no edge and no weight wouldn’t result in anything. So the sorcerers who were called sages chose silence and never took part in common conversation. But as for Gus, he talked, and he talked a lot. He laughed joyfully as he willingly talked about money and women and other lowbrow topics. Yet the power of his Words never weakened. Just as a single word from a normally silent person carries extra weight, there was a cutting sharpness in every word of truth from that man who tempered his genius with worldly affairs.
“Yeah, he’s great, isn’t he?”
As far as I knew, there had only been a single occasion when Gus had spoken anything like a lie: when he decided, in that gloomy underground city, that he needed to kill me.
“He’s my grandpa,” I said proudly and laughed. Menel laughed too.
After I’d set down my stuff, loosened my equipment, and allowed myself a little time to breathe, I left Menel in charge of everyone else and headed over to see Gus. I was looking for information from him.
Right now, Gus was a disciple of God — my god — and bound to this city, but at the same time, he was a sage from two hundred years ago. I thought he might know something beneficial, but that was not the case.
“Regarding the foul-dragon Valacirca, also known as the Gods’ Sickle and Calamity’s Sickle, I’ve never laid eyes on him.” Gus shrugged. “If I’d had the opportunity, I would have wanted to meet him for a negotiation at least once. If he hadn’t joined up with the demons’ forces, we would never have lost so many heroes’ lives in the fight against the High King.”
Gus explained that when it came to dragons as old as the gods, the choice of a single one to side with your forces or the enemy’s had an enormous influence on the balance of a war.
“If you’re going to fight him, I’d focus on his old wounds. Valacirca has fought all kinds of battles since ancient times, against Echoes and numerous heroes, and there are multiple rumors of times during those battles when he sustained wounds and had scales torn off. A dragon’s scales are tough. I’ll tell you now, I doubt even Blood could have cut to the skin through dragonscale.”
Joined by two dwarves, a human warrior, and a half-elf hunter, I was going to be heading to mountains ruled by a dragon, aiming to strike him where his scales had been torn off. It kind of felt like a situation I might have found in an old fantasy novel in my past world. It was no laughing matter that this was now my reality.
“What about the Word of Entity Obliteration?” I asked him about one of the plans I’d been thinking of. Gus had used that Word to take down the Echo of the god of undeath. If we used that, maybe we’d stand a chance…
“Well, yes, if it were to hit, then it could probably blast away a dragon, certainly.”
Gus obviously thought it stood almost no chance of hitting.
“Do you know the reason that Elder Dragons can soar swiftly despite their enormous size? The ancient dragons, as denizens of myth, are closer to the Words than we who live in the modern age.”
Therefore, dragons flew.
“Words soar through the air by nature. That’s why.”
Thanks to being closely connected to the Words, dragons could fly in disregard of all physical laws.
“That’s right. The most ancient of dragons are also users of the ultimate Words. What’s more, Valacirca isn’t a negotiator like the god of undeath. He’s a hardcore, seasoned warmonger. Will, you seem to have become a pretty good user of magic, but if you make this into a battle of Words, you will lose.”
“Magic battle: not in my favor. Got it.”
“A physical battle’s not in your favor, either. His size and the physical strength and toughness that come from it are no joke. As Blood would put it, you’re not a match in muscle.”
It wasn’t as if any of that was news, but it still hurt that I couldn’t win with overwhelming body strength. It meant that I couldn’t use the main strategy that had been leading me to victory so far.
“Since times of old, the tactic for killing a dragon has been to make full preparations, then wait for a moment when the dragon is unprepared and launch a surprise attack on its den. But this time… well, you know about the horde of demons around there. Valacirca is most likely using the demon forces as a replacement for a warning siren.”