Endless Online: Oblivion's Promise
Endless Online
Oblivion’s Promise
M H Johnson
Copyright © 2018 by M H Johnson
Cover art by Andrey Vasilchenko
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and events are the work of the author’s imagination and all locations are either fictitious or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real persons or events is entirely coincidental.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Thank You
Additional Links
1
"Val, are you awake?" Elise's gentle concern flowed through him, a balm to his soul.
"Poor bastard. I wouldn't wish a miscast like that on anyone," Gregor said. "Even someone as annoying as Val."
"It wasn't miscast," Halvar said with a knowing air.
"What, you mean it was supposed to leave him a scarred wreck with third-degree burns everywhere?"
"That's the nature of the spell," Halvar explained. "I've had a few wizards by my side during the years I served. Spells like that are retributive strikes or desperate last stand spells. They might sear everyone around you, but odds are you're going to pay a steep price for the casting."
"But how did Val even learn such a spell?"
"Beats me," Halvar said. "But if you recall, he cast a similar spell saving Elise."
Val could taste the former Highlord's frown as the sheet upon his skin was gently lifted off, a cool breeze strangely like air conditioning raising goosebumps upon his naked flesh as her soft chuckle washed over Val. "Well, at least things aren't quite as bad as they could be," Elise said dryly.
"What are you talking about?" Gregor snapped from a short distance away. "We've been taken captive by a colony of dwarves! Laser rifles pointed at our chests, and they have no reason to keep us alive. If word gets out that any dwarves survived the purge, the hunts will begin anew, and they know it!"
"Damn shame," Halvar sighed. "Some of the greatest artificers on record, and the High Council decides to wipe them out, simply because they were unwilling to accede all claims to their Valorium mines."
"The damned Highlords were more interested in Valorium sufficient to build stardrives for a hundred potential dreadnoughts than they were on nurturing geniuses that might one day produce marvels,” Sten said. “The dwarves tried to strike a bargain that would assure their prosperity and autonomy. Unfortunately, they hadn't counted on power-mad clans that could read minds and bring a score of dreadnoughts to bear on a single planet. Their doom was sealed, no matter how exotic their defenses were. They had no concept regarding the scale of destruction that fleet could bring to bear, and the Dominion enacted a single-minded campaign of extermination. The only technology they were interested in being whatever they could harvest from the devastated cities of their fallen foes."
"And then we humans colonized in earnest," Elise said, voice soft with regret. "No longer trying to understand the native inhabitants of this planet, to facilitate trade and understanding. Once the nature of its resources became known, nothing would do but for the Dominion to claim it all. Most especially the Valorium reserves. It is only fitting, I suppose, that it was the descendants of those original settlers that grew in power and capability, harnessing raw magic with little regard for tech, that managed to wrest half this world from Dominion control."
Halvar sighed. "Because by that point the Dominion had Elementium mines and Silbion plants aplenty, all of them bringing in rich harvests. they had far more to lose from guerrilla hit and run tactics enacted by mages who could bring fiery destruction upon any Dominion territory before fading back into the night. A far different battlefield with much greater stakes than when first the Darklords had declared genocide upon the natives, a thousand years ago."
"At least they got justice in the end," Elise said with a certain amount of satisfaction. "Whatever gifts allowed the dwarves to harvest Valorium ore so easily within the magic fields this world swims in has remained ever beyond the grasp of common man. We can extract only the tiniest fraction of what we could in other worlds with such stores, and the rate of mortality in such mines is nothing short of catastrophic."
"Which is just where we'd end up, even if we manage to escape," Gregor moaned. "The Dominion is all too eager for fresh chattel for the one Valorium mine that actually turns out ore here, on what they once hoped would be the jewel of their manufacturing hub, magical fields or no. And the lives lost per gram of ore, flesh melting from your bones, the slaves working there looking like living death in a few short months, is enough to leave you crying in your sleep!"
Val grimaced and shuddered, the awful imagery pulling him free of the soothing blackness he sought to sink into once more. He could feel the scowl come over his features, even as Elise pressed a cool hand against his brow. "Val? Are you with us?"
"Elise, don't do that! You know how fragile he... Ancestor's Mercy, look at him!" Gregor hissed in surprised disbelief, his concern turning to an accusing glare as Val forced exhausted eyes open, peering into Gregor's own.
"You! Hours ago, you were crying out in pain! Covered with burns! There is no way your flesh should be whole. No way!" An accusing finger jabbed at Val. "Smooth, free of all blemish? Hah! I knew you weren't human!"
Val blinked in confusion, mind still dizzy, vaguely sickened by the horrid memory of a gigantic chitinous monster wrapping him up in sticky webbing that had almost been his death.
"What the hell happened?"
Elise's violet eyes gazed into his own. "You mean you don't remember, Val?"
Val frowned, coming fully awake, odd flickers of memory crashing into recollection once more. "We were heading down the corridor when I heard cries of panic. I raced ahead to find the source."
"Putting your life in grave peril, jumping in head first, literally, when simple reconnaissance could have prevented you from getting ambushed." Halvar's words, iron hard with disapproval.
"I, well," Val sighed. "I'm sorry, Halvar. The sound of kids in peril? I couldn't hold back. It got the best of me."
Halvar sighed. "I get that, Val. And so might any other enemy seeking to lure you in and take you out."
Val nodded, knowing that truth all too well. "What about the children?"
"They are okay," Sten allowed. "We cut them free. Not easy at all, mind you. They were sobbing and crying before us, but none were seriously injured.”
“Good,” Val said, finally taking in his surroundings. Four beds, Val in one of them, two chairs, one table, four walls and a solid looking door. "So why are we in this cell?"
Sten shrugged. "You'd have to ask the dwarves that brought us in at laserpoint. Unfortunately, we're having a hard time understanding one another." He shook his head. "No doubt they're terrified for their safety." Hard eyes looked into Val's own. "Their very existence might be grounds for outrage and genocide, but I, for one, have never been a fan of Dominion policies. If they'd just let us go, I'd be more than happy to take an oath of
silence.”
Val blinked. "That's right, you all have Oathbinding magics in your world."
Sten shrugged. "In any case, it does us no good. They can't follow a word we're saying, and we don't follow their charts."
Gregor scowled Val's way. "Perhaps the homunculus can read them. I taste the magic principals involved in their tomes, but, other than that..."
Val blinked, fascinated despite himself to glimpse works his shockingly brilliant friends couldn't piece together, even with their meta-human cortexes. But he did have basic arcane literacy now, didn't he?
He smirked back into Gregor's cold grin, taking hold of the small bronze cube he was handed, feeling a soft hum as it vibrated, and suddenly his mind was filled with a brilliant 3-D matrix, an extra-dimensional variant of the hideously complex and convoluted charts he could only just barely comprehend when he had magical reference points at all ends, and in fact he had only come to terms with a single tome. Val now found himself lost in a sea of complex, hierarchical theories, concepts, proofs and variables, a dizzying display of brilliance and genius.
Even as he screamed and pulled his mind free, his heart ached that such incredible brilliance had been reduced to the remnants of a dying tribe forced to scurry for mushrooms even as vile predators like the ones they had faced preyed upon them. That much, at least, he understood. Not from any insights the tome refused to share, but rather from the strange gazes of the stocky figures who had just entered the chamber.
"See?" Gregor said with what Val thought unnecessary satisfaction, "I told you it would be completely over Val's head. Whatever knacks he has, it is animal instinct, not transcendental thought, that has gotten us this far."
But no one was paying attention. Gregor blinked, turned around, noted Sten bowing low. Grumbling, he did the same.
The powerfully built gray-skinned man gazed at them all coldly with ice blue eyes, dipping his head once as another entered. Val noted how he kept his hands on the sheathed blaster he wore, though he made no move to draw it. Val also realized that he and his companions were completely unarmed.
The second dwarf was also much like the first. Only slightly shorter than Earth Terran standard, but considerably broader. They looked more like power lifters than anything else, for in no way that mattered were they at all diminutive. And despite his voluminous silver-white mane, there was nothing frail about the second dwarf's appearance. He looked very much like the first figure who had entered, the exact same ice blue eyes, gray skin tone, and posture. Val wondered how closely related they were. If they truly were the last remnants of a dying race, they were probably very similar indeed.
For some reason, Val found himself thinking of ancient depictions of proud Native Americans. Their noble heads held high, brave and bold despite the decimation of their peoples, and even as he thought it, Val couldn't help feeling a sudden bitter remorse for their loss. An entire continent once theirs, a civilization host to endless wonder and scientific marvel, lost to the depredations of conquest. Just as it had been for these dwarves. Capable of so much, they just hadn't been ready for twenty Dreadnoughts flooding their skies with death, no doubt more than enough to bring any individual world in this so-called Dominion to its knees. Perhaps it had been fear as much as greed that had inspired the Darklords to destroy the dwarves. Knocking out a technologically gifted species before it could best them later, using whatever pretext was convenient.
As a tactician, Val understood the ruthless calculus involved, but he found his hatred for this Dominion blazing hot and fierce, all the more so when he thought of Julia, when he caught sight of Elise's beautiful, haunted violet eyes. And how she flushed and turned away from Val, as if somehow ashamed. And why should she be? It was those monsters who had broken her. She had been nothing but their pawn. And poor Julia's fate was doomed to be even worse, with no Clan bloodlines to assure even a modicum of decency in how she was treated. To be used up and drained dry, then thrown and butchered for sport when she was nothing but a rotting husk. That had been the impression Val had glimpsed of Julia's possible fate, and it made him seethe all the more with the need to find her, save her, set her free.
And make those bastards pay.
The elder dwarf's eyes widened. "Look how he glares," he said softly to his companion. "He's the one who butchered those arachnids?"
The younger one scowled. "I had hoped... but seeing his gaze now, he is no doubt like all those above."
"No!" Val quickly interjected, throat momentarily throbbing with the force of syllables said in ways he was unused to. "I am nothing like those monsters above," he continued softly, after coughing, careful not to injure his throat.
"The Highlords who did this to you. Who destroyed your empire, who ravaged your people just because you wouldn't give them your treasures, just because they feared what you were capable of becoming. I utterly despise them. For what they did to my friend, for their dark designs to prey upon my world, I would see those monsters burn!"
He trembled with fury. Shocked. Not having intended to admit such truths, the fury he felt in his heart and soul. Not realizing just how deep his bitterness ran until that moment. And how pathetic was it for him to play hero to someone he in truth hardly knew. Just the same age now as a girl who had captured his heart years before, only to fall to bitterest tragedy. As if saving Julia now could redeem him as well. As if he was anything but a bitter cripple with so much blood on his hands back home.
Sten was frowning, even as Gregor looked on in alarm.
"He's a tool of the dwarves, I knew it!"
Elise scowled. "Shut up, Gregor. He is no such thing."
"Val, talk to me. What's going on?"
Val shook his head at the captain's request, dizzy as two very different parts of his brain tried to process two very different means of expression. "I... I understand them, Captain. Please, bear with me. I can't think in both languages at once. My head hurts."
Gregor frowned. "Impossible. It took the most brilliant minds years to learn basic Dwarvish, before the Dominion found cause to wipe those few sympathizers out, along with the dwarves themselves. And that all happened almost a millennia ago."
Sten just nodded. "I'll leave you to it, Val. See if you can negotiate us safe passage out of here. We'll pay for it, and we'll swear whatever oath they like to keep their secrets."
The dwarves were peering at Val with surprise just as profound as his companions.
"You speak the true tongue?" the elder whispered.
Val grimaced, daring himself to speak, not even knowing what exactly he would say as his tongue shaped truths from his heart, from his core. "My brain tastes the truth of any word it hears in this world. In actuality, I'm an idiot-savant." He shivered, nodding to himself, accepting that humbling truth. "I seem to understand the intent behind words when someone speaks to me, even if I never heard the language before. Anything magical, I pick up by observation and feel. I get the sense that most can't manipulate forces of creation and flame merely from seeing a ghost cast it, or slide past the sight and mind of others, simply by embracing memories of serving as the most ruthless of killers." His cheeks flushed. Why must he say such things?
He swallowed, forcing himself to speak on. "But when it comes to understanding your writings, even the writings of the people I came with, so much simpler than yours, it is utterly beyond me. The interweaving of thoughts and ideas, so many relatives and variables, so many definitions and terms conveyed in a single chart..." Val shivered. "None save Einstein could hope to keep up, I think, and he was one Earthling among billions."
Val took a deep breath. "I am like a hound with a powerful nose who can help my friends track through the wilderness of violence and war. Here I am valued. In the wider abstract world my companions embrace, I would be as helpless as that hound, I fear. And I cannot even imagine how worthless I would be in your own realm. But with magic, at least, I am clever. I think. I don't know, really, only that I am the only one in my band that can manipulate it."
Val locked gazes with the white-haired elder before him. His heart raced to see the fierce smile light the older dwarf's features. The powerful figure gave a small measured nod before speaking. "I taste the truth of your words. Your mind is strange, human. I would understand it, and you, better. Tell me, why did you interfere with nature's dance?"
Val clenched his eyes tight. "The screams I heard were like those I heard on the field of war, over half a year ago. I could not save the children raped and butchered then. All I could do was find their killers and hunt them down to the last man." Val swallowed. "They will never rape again. But I could do nothing for the children who perished. These children I could save, and I would be damned if I had let them die."
Both dwarves looked shocked by his answer. "But you gain nothing. They are not of your tribe."
Val shrugged. "I didn't do it for me. I did it for them."
Both the dwarves exchanged a fathomless stare. "Why?" They asked in unison.
"Because they needed my help."
"Why?"
"Because my heart compelled me to."
"Why?"
Val shook. Choking words out. "The oldest girl... I felt her terror, her desperation, as she struggled in the strands. Then I sensed the smaller children beside her, also in peril. I couldn't bear to do nothing. I had to help!"