Chapter 5

As Mal set off to speak with Elsbeth, I motioned to Sania. “I’ll get Hakan back, then I’ll have to head back to Onnekus with Destruction.”

“Don’t worry Clive, I’ll keep everyone on task as best as I can. I did wanted to ask you something before you’re off again. Can I bring Wind of the Wild in on this? For all of his flaws, he is wise and he is capable. He wants to help too.”

My instant reaction was a flat no. He’d been a thorn in my side for a little while now and I partly blamed him for Sania’s death at the hands of Light, even though I knew that was unfair, he certainly hadn’t helped in the matter.

I also knew that it had nothing to do with me. If Sania wanted to involve him, then who the hell was I to deny her.

“Of course. That’s your choice to make and if you think he’s up to it then go for it. I’ll bring every one up a few levels to raise their Internal Connection, but after that I will be prioritizing who I give Mortal Neuma to. And by my reckoning he’ll be last on the list.”

“That’s fair. With the amount of followers you should be getting, I suspect that won’t be too much of a problem.”

“You’re not wrong,” I replied, pulsing out a message for Natom to return. “The flow of prayer bonds reaching my core hasn’t slowed at all. I’ve probably double the amount of followers I have.”

“So many?” she said, the words seeming to catch in her throat.

“Yep, and more coming all the time. It’s looking like I really will get all of our old Pantheon’s followers. “I was thinking about making Grigor a Spiritual Leader when Danivra stands down as he’s close very to reaching… Scratch that! He’s eligible to be made up now! Hell, Joel’s really damn close too.”

Sania’s eyes widened. “Are you serious? You could make Grigor a Spiritual Leader and you haven’t yet?”

“I only just saw. With us expecting Hakan on Earth, I was saving it for Sophie. A lot has changed lately.” I refocused on my bond again. “And why the fuck is Natom not answering?”

I’d expected an instant response, even if it was just him telling me I’d have to wait to be graced with his presence. I pushed a little deeper into the bond only to be hit with a faint yet unmistakable mental stench of fear. Something was suppressing the bond and I was pretty certain I knew who it would be. “Ah fuck,” I grumbled as my own fear rose.

“Clive? What’s wrong?” Sania asked, her hand resting on my arm.

I kept part of my mind open on Natom’s bond as I responded. “Something’s not right. That mad fucker is never scared and right now he’s terrified.”

“Hakan?”

“What else could do that? I need to go.” I activated teleport to him but it failed. With a frustrated growl, I tore open a portal. To my amazement it opened in Onnekus. If not for Sania’s scream of “STOP!” I would have stepped through. Instead, trusting her instinctively, I closed it back up just as a bright flash of power struck. The portal still closed, but a powerful surge of Neutral Neuma made it through. Sania staggered back a few steps and while I was relatively unaffected, I knew I'd been hit.

"It's a trap," Sania gasped, steadying herself.

"How did you know?"

"How did you not? Isn't Natom some kind of old disciple of Hakan? We should have thought about it before we let him go his own way. Seems to me he’d be one of the first Hakan would target after the gods. Especially if he sees that he's out of your grasp."

“That was Onnekus – Aly! Are the portal prevention barriers around Falritas down?"

"They are, Clive."

"Good. Can you make sure they stay down permanently, now I’m the Administrator?”

"I will have to ask Peace to carry out the actual authorisation, but yes.”

“Whatever it takes, just make sure they can't be put back up again." I turned to Sania. “Right, I’ve gotta go. I won’t just drop straight in this time.”

“Okay, but be careful.”

With a nod of agreement I portaled away, coming out around ten miles from Natom’s location.

Once I was certain there were no traps around me, I set off flying toward Natom’s location with all my senses wide open for danger. I covered the distance in around fifteen seconds, stopping only as Natom came into view.

He was suspended a mile above the ground, spread-eagled within an orb of power. I took in the weaves of the orb quickly, reading them to see how it contained him and only allowed certain aspects of our bond in and out. Enough to let me sense him only.

I attempted to dispel the shield from my current position, but whole thing construct changed as soon as my power touched it.

On my second attempt, I tried to look for a pattern in how the threads moved. It happened so fast I wasn’t any closer to understanding the process.

On my third attempt, I tried to trap the original threads of Neuma in place before they could move.

I almost managed it this time and though they slipped away from me, I knew there was something to work with. Which is when an enormous, Neuma draining Null-Shield dropped over me. It suppressed most of my abilities, but it was nothing to worry about, providing I didn’t remain inside for too long.

I cut my flight off and pushed out the wings from my back to save my Neuma output. As the trap had been sprung, I flew the remaining distance to Natom to work on his confinement.

I still expected some kind of surprise attack as I approached, but when none came, my brain jumped into overtime trying to figure out Hakan’s play here. I knew he wasn’t ready to go head-to-head with me yet, and he surely couldn’t expect a shield such as this to actually kill me…”

As a very frail, gray skinned Natom’s eyes slowly cracked open to take in my arrival, the truth hit.

“This is a fucking distraction!” I yelled to no one in particular.

He could have easily finished Natom off, but he’d kept him alive to lure me here. He probably expected me to fart around with the shield he’d built even inside the Null-Sheild which cut me off from everything.

“Not today, Hakan,” I hissed, opening my Void Storage with my reserves of power, wide enough to envelop the full construct holding Natom.

As it disappeared inside, I pulled out the totem, which thankfully ignored Hakan’s shield’s and transport me back to the Admin hub.

Still blocked from the outside world, I bounced from there back to Toukal and onto my altar in quick succession.

My blood ran cold as one of my bonds sang with fear.

Danivra.

She was in Cethain and without care for my own safety a second later, so was I. Whatever Hakan was playing at this time didn’t prevent me from teleporting directly to her.

I found I was seriously underdressed for the fight, with Danivra in her full giant spider form, thrashing and screeching in agony, Skewered though the torso by an extended Sword of the Alo-im held by non-other than a towering Hakan now returned to his Alo-im form.

He was as surprised as Danivra was relieved to see me. "Too fast again, Clive. I really need to stop underestimating you. I take it you have an Administration transport totem?”

I replied with an Ethereal Spicy ball followed up with a thrust from my own swiftly materializing sword, as I grew to match his size.

He dodged both without trouble and backed off to sneer. “There's no way you escaped my Null-Shield otherwise.”

I kept up my attack to the backdrop of Danivra’s rasping breaths. “Don't worry about what I do and how I do it you fucking bellend. Worry about how you’re going to pick up the thousands of tiny pieces I’m about to cut you into.”

“Hardly,” he snorted. “I still have far too much to do to be playing here with you right now. Like taking out every single member of your posse and letting the Neuma in their bodies restore me fully. Then I’m going to use the Neuma of your loved ones to kill you. But not straight away. I have ideas how you can serve me briefly before you die.”

As he spoke, I saw a faint tendril reach out from his mind heading towards mine.  It moved slowly and purposely like a snake hunting through the grass attempting not to be seen. But I see you, sly bastard.

“Instead,” he continued. “I’m going to put a servant bond on you, and then I'll have you reinstate me as Administrator. Then I’ll have you kill every last living soul in the Secondary Planes. Oh, and Earth. We wouldn't want to leave Earth out now, would we?”

“Not gonna happen numb nuts,” I said with the most casual disdain I could muster as the tendril came to within an inch of my forehead. Faster than a striking viper I sent out a tendril of Neuma from my own mind, stronger and built with Fire and Neutral. I grabbed a hold of his and pushed my power along it, sending a roar of rage and the thought that he should kill himself and do the universe a favor.

He recoiled from the attack and for a second it almost looked as though he would run himself through with his sword, but at the last moment he managed to wrestle control of his senses and defended against my attack.

“You know too much!” He roared. "But it will avail you nothing in the end. When everyone is dead by your own hands, I'm going to ride you like a horse, all the way back to the Abyssal Planes. And do you know what happens when you enter the Abyssal Planes carrying Neuma, Clive? It seeps out slowly at first, but the deeper you go the more rapidly it’s pulled out of you.

“And the body's a funny thing. It doesn't want to give up the Neuma, so it fights at first. But there comes a point where you can feel the very fiber of your being about to be ripped apart.”

I noticed he was keeping a defensive shield active around himself now as he spat his venom. He wasn’t taking any risks, but I still readied a Void Storage behind him in the hopes of trapping him.

I surged toward him in a sudden rush, opening the Storage behind him at the same instant and pulling it toward me. I hoped his surprise at my sudden move would cause him to retreat.

He did, but he also dismissed the storage with a thought.

“You’ll have to do better than that, Clive. Now where was I? Oh Yes. The Neuma pull. That’s why I needed to go slow and have a link back to you. To provide just enough to continue my forward momentum. But I’ve had a lot of time to think, and I definitely have better options when I go back this time. Like ride you full speed, like an idiot missile. And when I feel that pinch, just before we both go boom, I'm going to invest what I can't carry into your slave bound body and watch as you get ripped apart by the Abyss. If I do this right, I’m sure I can ride you pretty deep. I may only have lost a year overall, so definitely worth the detour back here.”

“Were you always this much of a tosser, Hakan?"

He ignored me, moving his attention onto Danivra. "I will see you later, milady." And then he vanished. I ground my teeth in irritation and shook my head as I faced the badly drained Dokalfar queen.

“I’m not taking no as an answer from you this time, Danivra. You’re coming back with me and I’m setting you free of the bond. Time to toughen up.