372 - Tribulation Begins [Sturmblitz]

A chamber deep within the Guardian Spire.

Twenty minutes ago, Victor was slowly working his way through an ancient, yet remarkably well-preserves book. Beyond merely centuries-old, it was a historical treatise from the height of the Ankhezian Imperium, mostly pertaining to conflicts in far-off colonies — written in the self-translating Ankhezian trade script, of course. Despite the dry writing style, the subject matter easily matched and even surpassed the most fantastical things Victor had encountered.

He had buried himself in the book as to distract himself, but it had not helped.

And so it was that he sat for hours more, quietly murmuring a sutra as he tried to keep himself centered.

Eventually, Elder Kanberich and Mistress Zelsys returned, bringing him back to the spire’s top. There, Kanberich brought out sticks of black, glittering chalk, and began drawing an array circle around Victor. He, of course, was situated in the middle. As Kanberich drew, he explained how the Guardian Spire contained a vast network of array formations for managing the intensity of external tribulations, only to cut this pillar of comfort out from under Victor by adding that the system only works to an extremely limited extent for internal tribulations such as the one he is about to undertake.

The pill came next, alongside a brass cup of Witch’s Brew. A pill… To call it a pill was an understatement. He wagered he could just barely fit it inside his mouth. He’d read the manuscript. Seen the alchemists working. He knew what this would do to him, even on its own, let alone in combination with the Dragonslayer Flame. It would make things easier, make the tribulation go quicker, and, in the end, would make him even stronger — or so his elders hoped. It would supposedly begin to take effect instantly, so he would take it only at the last moment.

Fear gripped him, but Victor knew that this was his best chance. He disassembled Daywolf, reshaping its mass into a miniature shrine around himself. Oculus in hand, he began chanting a sutra, summoning the power of Bishamonten. An iridescent aperture yawned open in the staff’s ring, Bishamonten’s physical core burning behind it. A numinous pressure descended, and a circle of shimmering haze took form around Victor, perfectly tracing the outermost perimeter of Kanberich’s formation. Mistress Zelsys went on observing the formation’s creation, pacing back and forth as she thought, her Thundergods tilting their heads, arcs sparking from their mouths in a form resembling the darting tongues of snakes.

Out of nowhere she took a deep breath, lightning arcing about her. A skull of gleaming metal took form, and around it, she shaped a serpent of writhing aura and lightning — Chrome Skull Viper. It grew until it was long enough to encompass Kanberich’s array, curling around its perimeter. However, instead of outward, the aura-construct directed its attention inward, at Victor. Its form slowly faded from physical visibility, but Victor’s eyes could still see it.

Kanberich finally finished the formation, its sigils angular and hard to read, and took up a position at the formation’s head. With the spear Zirnitra in hand, its wings unfurled and eye open, he brought out the dragonskin scroll. With a wide sweep of his arm he unfurled the scroll and released it from his grip, and at that instant, an overwhelming, searing heat bore down on Victor even through the protection Bishamonten afforded him, but he held it at bay with all his might. The scroll circled the formation, burning glyphs swarming from its surface, joining their counterparts in the formation and setting it alight. Besides relying upon his shrine guardian methods, Victor had the Antediluvian Gem as a trump card — he intended to direct dragonfire into the jewel if it threatened to overwhelm him, so that he could deal with it at his own pace.

Victor stuffed the Dragonheart Bolus into his mouth, kicking back the cup as he tried to swallow. Before he could choke, the mass seemed to disintegrate, washing down with zero resistance. Nonetheless, it burned on the way down, and the flame spread through his stomach before long. His flesh began to squirm inside him, heat filled his veins, and upon finally reaching his heart, it became a roaring blaze.

The Dragonfire Bolus, however, didn’t even remotely compare to the fire that consumed him when the Dragonslayer Flame Scroll completed its final circle and the formation had been fully lit. The artifact darted into the circle and enveloped Victor, bathing him in green fire. He screamed out in agony, his back arching as blood burst from his eyes, but the next instant, his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he slumped over, kept upright only by his ironclad grip upon the Oculus.

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A desolate landscape stretches unto the horizon — a city sprawling beyond the horizon in all directions. A scarlet miasma of cruel death hangs in the air. Buildings lay wrecked and corpses are strewn left and right. The footsteps of a deranged demagogue echo through the streets.

The Guardian looks down upon the symbol of his failure from atop the curled-up bones of a great beast, containing within its ribcage a temple. A miniscule sanctuary amidst the desolation, his shrine yet stands sacrosanct, quartets of onbashira pillars surrounding its perimeter in three layers, barriers of holy sigils scrolling between them. Thousands of people shiver within the sacred barrier’s boundary. Beyond the barrier, death stands waiting: A horde of twisted beasts, dragons of scarlet scale, with tufts of black fur protruding between them. Many of the beasts are bedecked by human flesh and clockwork, melded-together arms upon their backs gripping guns and chipped swords, ballistae swiveling on any free spaces, or needle-launchers embedded where the former wouldn’t fit. Many, still stand only as dragons, bearing neither assimilated gore nor machinery, instead bedecked in hundreds of gemlike eyes.

At the outermost barrier’s border, hounds of blackened steel and wolves of white bone rage against them, but bit by bit, their steel is melting and bone crumbling to dust. In the far distance, calamity does battle against calamity — towering far into the heavens, two giants of light are locked in bitter struggle, a giant of black and gold, and a giant of silver and lightning.