Wild Wastes 6 -ch 9-

“Remember,” Johanna warned them. “Stay close. Don’t leave the envelope of my formation.

“They have units, deities, and weapons that are just as powerful as what we have. They’ve had a long time to build and expand.

“There’s been a number of times where tech or items appear as if they’d just found it somewhere without explanation.

“I’d doubt very much if they’ve showed everything they can do yet. We have to be on our toes.”

“Agreed,” Vince confirmed.

He felt confident.

Up to a point, that was.

He’d been reminded as of late that while he was incredibly strong, there were those who were more so. Those that could dominate him in a different way entirely.

Johanna was a glaring and extreme example of that.

Mostly because he hadn’t ever truly managed to develop his ability to work with magic. Until he could defend himself at a basic level, he had a terrible weakness.

“Johanna, I want you to teach me to be able to kill you,” Vince said, firming up resolve. He needed to change. “If I run into a deity with your ability and strength in magic, I wouldn’t do so well. Need to be able to win a fight like that.

“You’re the goddess of magic and magical instruction so… if anyone can teach me, it’d be you. Wouldn’t it?”

“I’d be absolutely delighted,” Johanna answered excitedly. “Given the way you said that, others have tried?

“If true, that makes this even better for me. It’d increase my mythos significantly. That even those without talent or the method of teaching is unknown, I can reach a favorable result.

“Now I’m motivated to do this in addition to just wanting to teach you anyways.”

“Yes, there’s been several who have attempted to teach him,” Leila confirmed with an annoyed tone to her words. “I did myself. A few elves. Dryads. Pretty sure a Dragon tried as well.

“No one has been able to do much other than to get him to direct all of his power into a general direction or to enact a shield.”

“To be fair, that was enough instruction to give him the tools to take me down,” Johanna muttered. “So it wasn’t a waste. I’ll devote my all to your instruction. We can make it happen when that tour finally happens.”

“If the tour happens,” countered Blue with a long sigh. “I’d like to go visit everyone back home, introduce everyone to our new members as well, but if Prussany decides to push… well… Vince will be needed here.

“Actually, you know what, I won’t be going on that tour unless Berenga does. I’m rather fortunate already as it is that I’m able to be here with you all right now.”

“I’m sorry,” Ynes offered up, looking over at Blue.

The beautiful Dryad with a taste that didn’t match what a normal Dryad liked, and a smile that could make any living person consider their preferences, had originally been there to help Berenga.

Blue had taken over for her and become the permanent solution.

Berenga was unwilling to take anyone other than Blue now.

At the moment, Berenga and Petra were somewhat distant from this location

While there was a forward observation post, there was no reason for her to put herself into harms way.

It was likely that such an outpost would catch an artillery shell as soon as it was known to exist.

“Such is how it is as a High-Priestess of Dea,” Blue remarked with a low chuckle. “It’s fine. This is how it goes.

“It’s well known in the Dryad circles that you can be close to Vince one day, then separated from him for months. He hates it as much as we do but that’s life.

“It’s a good thing we’ll live eternally with him.”

Renata laughed at that and put her hands on her head.

“You know, it’s odd. Everyone in our inner circle is more or less eternal. Our lives are very different than the vast majority of people in Yosemite,” remarked the Dragon.

“That just means our story will go ever forward as long as we’re careful,” Ynes countered. “Though… dying really wasn’t that bad either.”

“It wasn’t, was it,” Renata agreed.

“Dying was hard if only because of the pain. Being dead was easy,” Elizabeth offered helpfully.

“Oh, yeah. I guess that’s what I meant. I don’t really remember much after I hit the ground,” Renata observed. “Should we stop here? This feels close enough?”

“It is,” Sam confirmed. “This is fairly close to the spark I worked out with Petra and Fes.”

“For what?” asked Ynes.

“Magical bombardment of smoke for everything around us. That way if Johanna does her formation thingie, it’ll be like we vanished into the smoke,” Sam answered smoothly. “I mean, let’s be honest, just because they stopped, and waved a flag, doesn’t mean they won’t just drop a bomb or something on us.

“These countries were so deep in this war that the list of atrocities is so long that there wouldn’t be a way to rectify. It’s just… they’ve done everything possible to each other and there isn’t anything left on the table.”

Vince grimaced at that. There was no way to argue that statement or any of it.

To be fair, each time he’d raised a white flag he’d been fired on. Today and previously in Spain.

“No one’s coming out,” Elizabeth relayed. “They’re not moving. They’re not even talking. They’re all just… staring at us.”

“Us or you. Cause I’d stare at you,” Vince countered.

“Need to get that Blue,” grumbled Renata. “Need her. Now. I can chat her up when we go back to the city.”

“I mean, I stare at you already as it is, Renata,” offered Vince with a laugh. “Alright… how long do we wait. I don’t want to be standing here just for them to try and drop ordinance on us.”

“Uhm… I don’t… hm,” Johanna whispered and looked upward. She gnawed at her lip then shook her head. “It’s fine. I had a moment of paranoia given your statement but… it’s as strong as I can make it.

“Zathira’s own shield, Leila’s shield, the Dryad shield, and the Dragon shield, all behind it, make this single point likely the strongest location there is.”

Vince had offered power to all of them, but they’d all declined in the end.

Though it did remind him of how he’d used to power up Elves.

The ones he’d normally empower were being powered by Dryads and Dragons in their partnerships. He was no longer needed for that loop.

In fact… really… the further along we go, the less and less I’m needed.

I’m not the leader, really. I successfully kicked that off to Petra, Yaris, and Berenga.

They don’t need me to give them overwhelming power, Legion tech and each other are handling that now.

Me as an individual can stomp nearly anyone out that isn’t magical based. My Dragons and others can deal with almost all of that now.

Those that are magical based can be handled by Johanna or some of the others.

Even if Johanna does manage to train me in magic, I still wouldn’t be needed.

At this point I’m nearly just a figure-head.

Someone they can point to as the “king of Yosemite” and attribute it to.

To generate faith toward.

I’ll get my long held wish to return my everyday life and enjoy myself one way or the other. At that point… what do I want to do?

“Well, look at that,” declared Leila. “They’re sending a little delegation. Apparently they’re willing to at least tell us something. Maybe they’ll listen, too?”

Vince blinked, then looked to the screens.

A group of people in uniform were indeed getting out of the trenches.

“What’s in Africa anymore? Supposedly a god of chaos wiped it all out but there has to be something there? Or better yet, where does the Prussany border end? What’s beyond it?” Vince asked curiously.

“Africa? Mostly nothing. It was indeed wiped clean of all life. There’s nothing there at all other than Dragons that roost there,” Johanna answered. “They go elsewhere to get things, then come back.

“East of Prussany is Russia. Russia and more Russia. It’s a lot of very technological backwards peoples and places. They were hit pretty hard by the portals and their government fell apart.

“Prussany took some of their lands then gave up. There’s too much of it, a lot of it is barren winter wastelands, and there’s almost no reason to go into those tundras.”

Oh?

Oh… ooooh.

I like that.

What if I head east of Prussany?

I could vanish into those lands for a time. That’d be fun.

Wander about… maybe… maybe try being a ranger again.

That could be fun.

Only take a few people with me.

If they need me I can just take a tablet or a phone with me connected to the Legion satellites. That’d keep me in contact and that’d be that.

Vince’s instincts began to shriek at him and he found his gaze snapping up to the horizon. To a blue sky that was empty of clouds and had nothing in it.

Reaching out with his left hand he snatched up the shield that Johanna was holding around them.

Acting on that instinct and aiming for the best result, he channeled power into the shield from his grove. Quickly raising the power it held and hardening it.

His gauntleted fist began to spark wildly as it acted as a conduit for him to the shield.

“Vince?” Leila asked.

“Instincts are going wild. Something is coming. Happening. Don’t know,” growled Vince. “Want as thick a shield as I can put up.”

Johanna reached over and laid her hand atop the gauntlet.

The stream of power coming out of his grove was suddenly rearranged.

Ordered.

What he was outputting was now being built into the shield with precision and care. Rather than just flooding it.

“Oh… I… I think I understand now what everyone means. You’re not a magician,” Johanna remarked. “You never will be. You yourself is a conduit.

“You can never truly be trained. You can’t become a magic user in any way.

“What you can be trained in, what you can actually become, is empowered. To embrace the fact that you’re a conduit.

“I’ll teach you how to use your power to empower yourself. Once we get that worked out, as well as teaching you how to shield yourself in a Null shield… well… magic won’t be a threat to you at any level.”

“Grand,” grumbled Vince. Strange thoughts bubbling up from deep inside his mind. That if he was a conduit, it wasn’t so much as being a magician, as it was trying to channel out something that existed. Or so he thought.

Another thought tripped through his head of Johanna mentioning tying Nulifier shields so that they didn’t simply turn off.

“Teach me later,” Vince stated firmly. “For now just help me make your shield ridiculously overpowered. So that whatever I feel like is going to happen, doesn’t.”

A hollow boom resounded behind Vince.

It caught him off guard to the point that he turned halfway around, rather than just looking at the camera’s that were rear facing.

The sound had been singular at first, but was now a continuing onslaught.

Staring off to the north-west he wasn’t sure how much the Sword of Yosemite was changing the way this sounded.

And felt, for that matter.

There was a roiling and thundering to it that could be felt despite there being nothing visual to be seen yet.

Vince felt that it reminded him of a continuous stream of guns, artillery shells, or bombs were exploding in a never ending way. It was reminiscent of the portal storm in a way with overlapping booms echoing out.

“What the heck is that,” Vince whispered.

“His gaze had been hard focused on the view of the sky, even as his instincts continued to rail at him to flee.

“I don’t know but it’s not good,” muttered Ynes. “The ground, the trees, everything is screaming. Screaming like… like our trees would in their pots… something is horribly wrong.”

Even as Vince stared out into the distance he could feel a rumbling sensation spreading through the boots of his armor and moving upward.

As if he were experiencing an earthquake.

“The air stinks,” Sam whined and flew down and landed on Vince’s shoulder. Though she was significantly bigger now, she fit fine when he was in this armor. “I flew just out of the shields and… it’s… it’s disgusting. Like spoiled milk.”

“Spoiled milk?” Renata asked sounding confused.

The explosions fell away.

Then a cloud the color of blood raced toward them.

Shooting across the horizon and spreading out quickly across the whole of everything. To the point that one could see a shadow racing across the ground coming toward them as it blocked out the sun.

“Vince… what do we do?” asked Blue, who sounded nervous.

“I don’t know. I wish I could tell you. I have no idea what’s going on,” answered Vince, watching as the world took on a red hue.

“It’s Null and the Hungry One,” reported Ferris from somewhere above Vince. “They’re battling over Francia and England. You… don’t want to be under those clouds.

“Not unless you’re a worshiper of Null. While he’s weaker in some ways than us, he’s really well off fighting against that Demon.”

“In other words… we need to make sure we declare our border is firm, shore it up with faith and… pull it all in?” asked Vince. “We’ll have to send a message to Prussany another time.”

“I don’t know. That cloud is all magic based. It’s a lot like those dark clouds that attacked you,” Ferris continued then sighed. “This is terrifying. I don’t even know what to say about it. This… this is all… yes.

“Fall back to our borders. Give up anything we don’t want to maintain. We’ll…. I don’t… I don’t know.”

Ferris sounded confused and lost.

Bereft of direction and possibly even hope.

“My priests are rushing to the border. As is anyone who can hear me,” Johanna advised sharply. “I’ve instructed everyone to erect a Nullification barrier.”

“Ferris, get ahold of the Whites,” instructed Vince. “I need them to create a device that’ll project a shield based on the Null school of magic. One that’ll go upward into the sky.

“We’ve got lots of magical power laying around to power it as well as faith. Let’s see if we can’t get that going.

“We’re going back to Petra and Fes. Now.”

“Okay, I can do that. My physical body is in Yosemite right now anyways,” Ferris reported. “Should I do anything else?”

“No. Any type of order I’d want to give beyond this, would need to get their opinion first. I think this changes everything. Changes what we were planning,” Vince finished with a shake of his head. “Back to our lines. Back to our lines and try to figure out what we’re supposed to do about this.”

Not looking to the lines of Prussany, or even the people they’d been hopefully waiting for, Vince and company mounted up on Renata and Elizabeth then prompty flew back to the lines.

By the time they landed, Vince could see that Petra was already organizing a withdrawal. Soldiers and citizens alike were rapidly moving through emergency portals that’d been thrown up by Legion Engineers.

“This one is grateful that you’re safe!” Petra called then gestured to a portal that had just opened up. “We must take this portal and flee. This will take us back to our formal lines.

“Ferris already relayed everything that you and she discussed. We’re actively working to create a fire break of sorts.”

“Fire break?” asked Leila, sounding confused.

“This one heard what Vince requested. The need is to eliminate magic and sources of magic,” Petra explained. “Then we must utilize the last Dragon version of the soul-bombs that we have in storage.

“The portal-storm will act should the cloud advance. That barrier is secure. Here, and to the west where the storm ends, we will detonate local explosive soul-bombs. Though the one to the west is the artificial one that you created, Leila.

“It is regretful, but there needs to be a separation for us. Your plans to determine if you can reverse the non-artificial weapons will become a priority need, Leila.”

“That’s… we can’t… okay. I see,” hissed the gnome as people began moving in and through the portal. “When do you plan on—”

A shrieking roar sounded from behind them along with a muffled explosion.

Vince didn’t need to turn and look over his shoulder to know what it was.

That was the last dragon soul-bomb being detonated.

“We need to go. Now. Back to lines we made attached the portal storm.

“We’re going to detonate the bomb at a distance that we determined to be safe for our lines, due to testing with the Tri-Lliance bomb,” Fes commanded moving up to stand next to Petra. “Even as we work to plan for the world around us, everything changes and becomes ever more chaotic.”

Everyone looked to the red-cloud as it moved forward.

It didn’t seem to be moving as fast now, though it was of course, still moving. Creeping ever onward and across the horizon.

“That’s incredibly far away,” Zathira stated. “So… so far away. Yet it already looks so massive. It’ll blanket all of Francia soon.

“All of Europe, in fact. All of it.”

Vince grimaced, looked away from the screen that showed the cloud, then trooped through the portal.

Well, Null… I guess it’s time for you to do what you were brought into being to do.

To fight the Hungry One.

The fact that you went to sleep and your people went wild… tells me all I need to know about ‘going to sleep’ as a god.

All I need to know.

Going to sleep as Ferris described has to be avoided.

Or if not avoided, it needs to be sectional. Only a few from the pantheon going to sleep at a time.

That way there’s always a number of us awake and ready for the world.

With that thought though… Prussany uses deities as weapons.

Could I head that way and see if I could break any other gods or goddesses free?

Get them out of terrible situations like what Johanna was suffering under. To pull more deities over to my side.

At the same time… I need to figure out how we fight the Hungry One.

It’s obvious that as long as it exists, we’ll be under threat. Now or in the future, it’ll be a looming danger hanging over Yosemite.

Eliminating the Demon or binding him somehow… well… something to think on.