Trouble With Horns

71: Fist First Into the Fray

The portal was off in a courtyard behind the enchanter’s guildhall, carefully enclosed within a set of delicate stone warding totems. It looked different than I’d expected, the portal. When someone says portal, you think of a glowy blue circle or something, but nah, that wasn’t this thing.

Instead, it was a ten foot diameter ball of boiling black mist, so thick and impenetrable that you couldn’t hope to see the other side of the courtyard through it. What piqued my interest was the little red, blue, and green sparks that periodically lit up its enigmatic depths. It was a blue I recognised, deep and dark. My blue.

Adventurers were being called forward based on wooden tickets they held, so there wasn’t any congestion trying to get through the portal. We still had a little while to wait, but Dawn and I just spent the time whispering happy banter between ourselves. I don’t think there was ever going to be a day where talking to her would get boring.

“Number 12!” the mage in charge called, snapping us out of a conversation about how the political situation in UNC was looking wilder by the day.

Dawn held up our little wooden tile and took my hand, leading us through the thinned crowd. “Ready? Oh, and do you mind if I film any fights and adventures we get into? I know we said we didn’t want to stream or whatever, but we’re pretty amazing to watch.”

“Sure, why not?” I shrugged, smiling into her fiery eyes. “If it’s you in control of the footage, I don’t mind one bit. I trust you.”

“Thanks, babe,” she grinned, expression going all gooey for a moment before she turned back to the task at hand.

The mage sounded bored as he waved us towards the portal, his well rehearsed speech rolling out off his tongue in a monotone. “You’re number 12? Good, please walk slowly through the mist. There is no telling where within the realm of energy you will step out. The enchanter’s guild does not take responsibility for any harm you may experience as a result of unfortunate materialisation within the other world. The exit portal will remain in place until you leave, after which you will not be able to return to the same area. Please make sure you have everything you wish to bring back before you make use of it. Thank you.”

“Why do I get the feeling that warning is going to be very on point when we get through?” I asked as we stepped up into the boiling black mist.

Dawn’s answer was a low, wry chuckle, and she threw me a look. “Yup. Better go through swinging then, because we both know this game loves fucking with us.”

On a whim, I dropped her hand and readied to do just that. The whine of my gauntlets’ engines revving up and echoing around the courtyard was the last thing we heard before the world went quiet.

My fist flashed forward, the first thing out of the mist, so fast that it dragged some of the wispy darkness with it. The steel of my knuckles connected, meeting a resistance that rapidly gave out with a brutal cracking sound.

Stepping out of the portal, my eyes scanned our new surroundings with a sharp focus. We were in a forest that glowed with an eerie cyan light, and the air was bitterly cold, like it was made of glass.

Around us were several familiar faces, those of the strange minotaur-like people who had attacked Gienia during the cauldron event all the way back when. Except now, I had horns just like them, sans the strange blood that dripped from the glowing runes they were inscribed with. My fist had just smashed the skull of one deer man, sending him and the spear he had been poking into the mist back several meters. Time to get revenge, I think.

Dawn moved next, a rush of magical energy surging out of the portal, hair aflame and skin as black as coal. Her sword flicked up to take one of our enemies in their grey-furred throat. Blue blood boiled as she summoned flame down the blade and ripped it free in a single downward swing, like she was striking an old match.

Trusting my girlfriend to keep my back protected from the enemies closest to her, I coiled my momentum into a hungry viper and pulled some of my own innate lightning into the blow. Activating the lightning ability caused my inhuman features to manifest like a flower unfurling to greet the sunrise. Wings lifting high, I sighted my target and unleashed.

The crack of lightning, and my fist caught a deer man in his human chest. Blood and lightning intermingled, the latter using the former as a bridge to the ground. In the corner of my vision, I saw the damage I had done pop up. It was a lot more than the last time I had encountered these guys. Hell yeah.

Now I just had to remember what all my abilities were…

Blocking an axe by catching the blow on my armoured forearm, I chose to use one I had been thinking about since the one time I had used it before.

My adversary staggered, recovering from his failed blow. He was a six and a half foot hulking brute of a deerman with grey skin and fur, he was perfect for what I had planned. Grabbing him by his deer’s neck I spread my wings and threw us both into the air with a wild and heady abandon.

We reached a height of twenty or so meters in the blink of an eye, then hung there in the air, a still image of grace and violence. My body was arched into a half-moon shape with my enemy held aloft above me like an offering to the goddess of storm and thunder. We capsized in slow motion until I was above him, wings furling to let my magic take control of our momentum.

Dirt erupted in all directions as we impacted the forest floor like a railgun round from orbit, the whip crack of my lightning following a moment later to lash the field with its power. Devastation rolled out in a wave, my new levels and recently adjusted abilities translating into grisly carnage.

All about us, deer men staggered as my sharpened lightning dealt them heavy damage. One particularly strong dude recovered quickly, coming at me with teeth bare in rage. I threw his mangled comrade at him.

I was about to follow it up with a blast of lightning energy, which I wasn’t exactly short on right then, but Dawn beat me to it. Her hand closed over the side of his face in a vice grip, and moments later her arm went red with eye-searing heat. The monstrous man screamed and flailed, dropping his axe as he tried to rid himself of that terrible burning hand. She drove him screaming down to the ground and held him there, burning eyes merciless and filled with the fire of battle.

Lifting my arm high, I gathered the lightning I had just generated into a nail of energy and turned my gaze on the nearest enemy to my girlfriend. Like they weren’t all rushing her while she grilled the poor bastard like a fucking prime steak.

My spell coalesced above one of the deermen, and when it was ready I brought my arm down in a quick, decisive movement. Thunder boomed, and my lightning hammered down on the enemy, blasting an arm off my target. The force of the spell caused the air to rush past me, bringing with it the smell of burnt fur.

Dawn’s victim began to glow with an internal fire, and expecting another explosion I took a step backward. Instead, it disintegrated into a thousand tiny sparks of light that flowed up into her skin, covering her arms where they were bare.

Oddly, the ground still shook, just slightly, and I frowned, trying to figure out how her fiery consumption of our enemy had done that. Then I noticed the leaves of the trees shudder slightly, and it clicked. Footsteps, and big ones at that.

“You feel that?” I asked quickly, scanning our surroundings while the deer men closed in on us.

Dawn nodded, lifting her blade into a ready position again. “Yeah. You think it’s one of the big ones?”

“Probably,” I said, lips quirking into a little smirk. “Considering how this game likes to fuck with us, I’d say two of them are on the way.”

“Better get to collecting lightning then,” she chuckled, nodding agreement.

She wasn’t wrong. My new passive was very useful. It meant that I could collect and store a portion of any stamina I used as lightning, then infuse abilities with it later on for big dick damage. Metaphorically speaking, of course. My real big dick days were behind me.

Right as the next enemy dude was about to reach her, Dawn turned her attention back to the enemy and… disappeared. What followed was quite possibly the most anime shit I had ever seen.

She flickered from enemy to enemy, her white-hot sword leaving a trail of light in her wake. It bit deep into each one, cutting through otherworldly flesh and bone as though it had all been slow cooked to perfection beforehand. Five enemies disintegrated into so much ash when she was done, and my girlfriend stood in the middle of it all. My warrior goddess was back.

The fire she’d absorbed from the first guy was gone from her limbs and blade, so I guessed that she’d consumed him for the energy to pull that off. She was mysterious with the abilities she’d crafted, that was for sure. Either that or she just forgot to explain it all to me. Probably that one. We were both pretty bad at that, to be honest.

Dust and ash billowed out behind me as I launched myself at one of the remaining deer minotaur dudes, but to my surprise he sidestepped my attack. His axe caught me in the stomach on the way past, placed there like an outstretched foot, but sharper.

My arms came up to protect my head as I crashed into a tree, wood splintering in all directions. Fuck, that had hurt! My armour had kept the axe from gutting me, but I was going to have a cunt of a bruise. Thank fuck we had levelled up since the last time we met these chucklefucks, otherwise I’d probably just be dead. I deserved the bruise though, my fighting technique relied on raw speed more than anything resembling finesse.

Now or never, I guess?

He was rushing me, axe ready to either strike or block. Using the abused tree as a springboard, I launched myself with the combined power of my wings and jet engines. Their roar was a deep, guttural thing that sent goosebumps over my skin every time I used them. So damned cool!

The moment I launched, I gathered lightning over my fist, then jabbed it forward and simultaneously lashed out with my lightning strike ability. My trajectory took me over my adversary, forcing him to swap his guard up in an attempt to block any sudden change in direction I might take. How he knew to watch for that, I don’t know, but for once I had anticipated shenanigans. He didn’t expect the fist of pure lightning that slammed straight into his unguarded and unarmoured chest.

With his guard broken, I turned my momentum downwards into him and my clenched fist took him in the face. Bits of deer-head flew in all directions, mercifully fried beyond all recognition by my lightning.

Damn, what a mess… next please!

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