Apostles of Doom

Talarius shook his head. From this distance he could not hear the screams, but he imagined it was horrible. The size and scope of this battle, along with their resources, had sort of shielded him from the very real horror of battling the Unlife. Yes, these ghouls were foul, infected creatures, but they were mortals; the devastation of the crushed ghouls was thus still stomach turning.

The giant shifted to its flesh form in order to get up. The other giant knight struck at the bergrisi’s exposed elbow, slicing deeply and causing a roar of anger and pain from the giant as it stood.

“Aim for the eyes!” Stainsberry told Talarius.

Talarius nodded. They were at a very long range, but his Holy Lightning Arrows were not subject to the normal laws of gravity and air resistance. He focused with his visor and began releasing a quick volley. Three struck before the giant was able to turn enough to shield his eyes.

The giant took off running away from the wall once more, the two knights in pursuit. The giant edged left, even as the army at the edge of the cleared path began frantically trying to flee the region as the giant drew near them.

Talarius blinked in surprise as a very large zombie dragon suddenly appeared, diving out of the sky to attack Hilda. The dragon was about one-half the size of giant-Hilda, but still quite deadly.

“Crap, here come more!” Stainsberry said as a two-hundred-foot-long serpentine dragon zombie came down and began wrapping itself around the other giant knight.

The dragons, and now a flock of pterosaurs, were viciously attacking the giant knights, allowing the running bergrisi to get further ahead and begin doubling back. The giant was soon charging towards the wall of the citadel again. Unfortunately, the giant undead beasts attacking the two knights were taking all their attention.

“Well, it looks like I’ve found a good use for my last lightning bolt,” Stainsberry said as he took aim at the approaching giant. “I’m going to give it a moment to get closer for a stronger hit.”

Talarius nodded, scanning the battlements to make sure everyone was gone. He stepped back to peer down inside and saw people quickly moving away from the wall. He nodded and drew his bow again, aiming at the giant’s eyes once more, and began a new barrage.

“Ghairm mi a-nis an dealanaich de na diathan! Le mo bòidean a 'mhòid-cheartais, faodaidh!” Stainsberry shouted, even as the bergrisi shifted into a thundering stone golem charging the wall. The bolt crashed into the stone golem, causing a hail of powdered rock to fall on whatever was left below it, but its momentum did not seem to be affected.

“Brace for impact!” Talarius shouted as loudly as he could, using his helm’s power to magnify his voice. He and Stainsberry moved above the wall.

Talarius glanced back; the outer courtyard for this region was almost clear. People were fleeing through the gate in the inner wall. The battle was about to move inside the outer wall.

KABOOM!!!

The entire citadel rocked as the two-hundred-foot tall stone golem bergrisi crashed into the one-hundred-and-fifty-foot outer wall. A deafening rumble followed as the outer wall began to collapse under the impact.

Interdiction Road

“This is not good!” Ramses cursed. He and Exador were busy trying to stabilize the interdiction. The destruction of the Tomb Gate had sent multi-spatial ripples through the entire area. That had been the disorienting reality warp accompanying the explosive destruction of the gate.

Those ripples had disrupted the beacons and they were scrambling to restabilize them. However, it was now being complicated by the fact that while Atun was shining brightly on the battlefield, the sea where the beacon ships were sailing was incredibly stormy.

His demons were reporting that the winds were dangerously high and that the sails had been furled and the ships battened down. On top of this, the seas themselves were experiencing huge waves that appeared to be independent of the wind.

Exador shook his head. There could be no question that the avatars of Krinna and Namora were trying to break the interdiction. However, one problem at a time, Exador reminded himself.

Citadel of Light, Southern Wall

“What the…?” Tom shouted as the Citadel behind him shook against his back. There had been a tremendous crashing sound, and now he could hear what sounded like a rock slide in the distance.

Tom had his back against the wall, once more wrestling the frost giant. Targh and his team were currently beset by a huge swarm of flying undead monsters. He had thought they’d made good progress over the night in killing off the large flying zombies, but apparently they’d found reserves.

“That sounded like an outer wall collapsing!” Darg-Krallnom shouted. I’ve heard it many times before. I prefer the sound when I am the one doing the crashing!”