Part 19: Invading Demiplanes

Chapter 12: Invading Demiplanes



“Agile Mind” was a great spell, sought by many mages. It might not exactly extend life, but it did expand consciousness. It suppressed the disbelieving part of the mind that resisted magic as something “irrational”. It made it easier to still care about your mortal subjects, no matter how meagre they were in comparison to your own power. It almost reduced certain spells to cantrips.



However, “Agile Mind” did not offer answer as to why casting it bathed the region in purple light for a few days. Still, nothing bad came out of it, even though Golddale duck saw an increased rate of pregnancies and discovery of something called “jazz”.



After “Agile Mind”, Helia’s “Blessing of the Sun” seemed like a trifle. Sure, it made crops grow faster and casting it made you feel like Helia’s warm words were gently caressing your mind, but King Lich V already had other spells at hand.



Away from purple glows and agile minds, the werewolf numbers in the western expedition were growing, with court weres leading packs of younger noble weres. The fresh young troops saw this expedition as a grand adventure and as a way to prove themselves, especially since the going wasn’t that tough. The number of ogres was a little alarming, but nothing some tooth and claw couldn’t handle.



Not everyone had a chance to prove themselves on the frontier, however. Snoop-Jim‘s felt that he was quickly outstripped by new, flashy warriors, while he was kept behind the lines, to look for mysteriously spawning trouble or Dremer incursions.

To calm his mind, he spent time reading old scrolls and sacred texts to calm his mind and become a more philosophical warrior-poet.

“Yo, dis home be channeling his spirit and sheet, get rekt, Drema foo”



“Mana Spring” was a strange that improved mana production. Working on the old adage “you have to spend mana to gain mana and burn cities with your mind powers”, it was a combination of various effects: straightening copper conductors, fixing grammar mistakes in runic wording, various quality of life improvements for mana barrel makers, and so forth.

Naturally, King Lich V immediately forgot about it.



“Elven wenches!”

“Gems!”

“Anchor!”





The merchant struggled to drag the sack of gold out of the throne room

“Thank you, sire! You won’t be sorry for buying this!”

King Lich V just waved his cold dead hand impatiently and dismissed the merchant. A small lizard person stepped forward and let out a burst of words that mentioned jujus, koatls and other strange things.

“What on Ardania could the little critter mean to say?”

“Sire, I have no idea”

“Allow me, my liege. While I was still human, I had some travelling done and I think I recall some of the language of Koatls, this being one of them.”

“Ahem”

“Ah, yes. This one claims that his name is Morlock and he had been sent by his master, Pakatz Ringing, a high koatl. Seeing as you are the only one capable of fighting Dremer – coming of which had been foretold in Koatl holy texts – he wants to offer you his services. But not for free: he wants gold he could spent fortifying his village so that it would survive in his absence”

“…what is a high koatl, anyway?”

“*polite cough* I might finally be of service. I just remembered something of that name being mentioned in of the books I had. In his "The Overall Description of Everything", Master Alfus Bumblegate states this:

“High Koatls are the exemplars of versatility. In the tradition of their nation they take whatever role is most needed by their people at a given moment. If ambassadors are needed, then High Koatls will be ambassadors; if there is a need for traders, then none can trade better than a High Koatl; if war is at hand, even seasoned battle marshals would be glad to serve under the command of these fearless commanders. With equal ease the High Koatls can be mages, astrologists, prophets, cooks, or nurses. And if there comes a national holiday, and a sacrifice should be made, then the High Koatl always has a traditional sacrificial knife at the ready.”

“Interesting. Do we have money to pay him?”

“After buying that ring? No, my liege”

“Can we catch the merchant?”

“Again, no, my liege. Reading the text will have given him enough time to disappear among the market vendors, probably to get robbed or blow his money on gnome prostitutes”.

“Well, tell Morlock to wait a bit…”



“Sir, the younglings are charging forward, they’re aiming for the anchor!”

“I’m not surprised. They have tasted blood and seen the frailty of the ogres! It’s perfectly understandable”

But then there was a horrible crack of magic, a great stench arose and black lights flashed on the horizon.



“All of them… gone… just like that…”



If the werewolf captain was frozen because of shock, soon enemies of King Lich V would be literally frozen. A new minor spell was discovered among the scrolls. “Fanfir’s Disclipine”, it was called. As the name suggests, it horrendously misused: Fanfir was a mage who styled himself a great warlord and a great warlord needed a great army. Unfortunately, Fanfir was bad a tactics and worse at leading or training men, to the extent that he couldn’t get them to stand in formation.

His final solution was to freeze them in place. Unsurprisingly, this lead to his demise when his frozen army was defeated by a rampaging mob of drunk gnomes.



“…and that’s why some need to make sacrifices for the cause” said King Lich V before using a spell to push a goblin spearmen unit through a magical portal.

On other side, goblins were starting pick themselves up from the ground. The ground was pink, soft and cool, covered in places by soft green grass. And almost everywhere you could see lush pink forests swayed in the wind.

The goblins were starting to feel good and maybe even happy about this new predicament. At least they would be fighting in nice place, with ample places for desertion.

Then the monsters fell on them.



"Only certain of the inhabitants of Ardania turn into ghosts after death, and only certain ghosts choose vengeance as the principle goal of their existance. But it is fine to behold what wonders can be done by one who is devoted to one single goal. Especially if that someone is not restricted by time limits..."
(From "Necrarium Tomeus" by Necromaster Barbaross the Deceased)

“So, it’s the ghost that killed our brothers”

“That is most troubling to see and hear. I saw a captain spar with the ghost that was in the King’s employ. Claws and fangs are basically useless against it”

“Well then, sound the retreat and hope our king comes up with a plan”.



"These elementals are in essence living diamonds, which - as you might imagine - makes the task of harming one a fool's errand."
(From "The Overall Description of Everything" by Master Alfus Bumblegate)

“…and these findings lead me to conclude that the Riltirn Punitive Expedition should either be either abandoned or postponed, since the presence of Diamond Elemental would make the conquest really difficult”.



“Another benefit of this expedition to the Eastern Seas was the discovery of “heavy stones” mechanic. Now, carrying heavier stones aboard the ship aren’t an option. However, using a derivative mechanic of flaming stones, we use Elven script to inscribe the stones with the hardest philosophical questions faced by the Arethi – therefore the hardest philosophical questions in Ardania – as well as with parables, riddles and other such quandaries. So the stones become heavy with meaning and crush our enemies with weighty existential questions”.

“Those Elves really spend too much time staring at the engine cores, it’s unhealthy”.



“Well, the imps are now dead, but at least they torched that Thicket and got some barrels of mana through”

“And the spell, my lord. This is going to be of much use in our upcoming fights”



“As my lord sees, this is exquisite armor made from the finest, hardest to obtain materials. Why, some of them are said not to exist in qualities needed for armor or are stupendously difficult obtain! Many of them had been obtained by paying large piles of gold to the eastern farmers, who spend day after day looking for rare materials to sell. Truly this is a worthy investment!”

“Worthy it might be, but I don’t think the realm could afford it at the time.”

The merchant stood there, puzzled and scratching his head.

“Could his highness then spare some rash ointment or spell? To keep the good business relations…”



But how can one spare mana or attention when the biggest transplanar invasion was happening at that very moment?

The crack trained veteran court werewolf elite, laden with best magical gear and powerful enchantments, were the first ones to cross the boundary between world and enter the demiplane. Once they secured the beach head, additional units meta-teleported in and took their place on the battle line. Even trolls were there.

Overall, the landing was a bit scattered but it was expected that werewolf skill and resilience, backed with magic, would win the day.



Back in Ardania, there were still some matters to be taken care of. Unwittingly dragged into a war against Sol de Torvega, King Lich V elected to sign a separatist peace agreement that would end the hostilities. He sweetened the deal with a Harvest Blessing spell. Not that that the deal needed sweetening, but it was apparent that other great mages needed all the help they could get.



“Sword of Truth” hovered over Riltirn, blasting defenders and guardhouses to dust. The captain signaled the King to announce that they had found another anchor, and then ordered the ship to descend, right in front of the mayoral mansion.

“This is an outrage! How dare you attack us, the true servants of the Truth? You who sold your hides so cheaply once lord Amberon fell! You infidels!”

The only answer to the accusations was the sound of magical driver spinning up…



A great axe slung over his shoulder made sparks on the rock floor as a great barbarian approached King Lich’s throne.

“King of bones! Lord Krolm sends you a request! Build a temple, a great temple of rough stone and hard wood, fill it with nubile maidens, great warriors and vaults of ale and vine! Dedicate it to Krolm! Earn his favour in such way and he’ll grant you some of his favored Blademasters!”

Moved by the speech, King Lich V could do nothing more but agree.



However, it was a lot easier to shoo away another “great” goblin archer who wanted to sell his services to the King.



“This is the biggest butchery in the realm, m’lard. We started with them Wild Domesticatud Donkeys, and now we can chop up everything. Goats, sheep, sea serpents, ogres… everything will be cut up and sorted. We tried with Dremer, but that didn’t work. Their blood, it ain't right”.

“So, how is the meat sorted?”

“The best, freshest parts go to the werewolves, of course, the less choice meats are for gnomes and the few humans… and the rest is send to goblins, naturally”

“Naturally”

“Well, they don’t deserve better, m’lard. We tried to get them to work here, but then one o’em chopped his hand off, and the other started eating it”.



The Demiplane invasion was going full strength. Even some of the younger werewolf nobles were brought in for rearguard and mop up action. The invasion zone was already cleaned of enemy presence and the veterans were now tearing into earth and flame elementals.

The smell of burn fur was in the air, but werewolves were healing at an astonishing rate. Thus, while bloody, they were steadily advancing and pushing the natural inhabitants back.



“Sword of Truth” shuddered in the air. Magical shards of diamond were raining on it, piercing the hull, impaling the crew, cutting wires and smashing arcane control instruments. Soon enough, the ship could take no more, shattering into large pieces that fell to ground, all to the terror and ruin of people of Riltirn. But that wasn’t the end of their sorrow, since the engine detonated in the market square, tearing out a huge bunch of it and transporting it gods-know-where.



“M’lord, the goblin barracks are on fire!”

“It’s understandable. I tried the new flaming weapon enchantment on their spears. Predictable results, I’d say”.



“Magic node is very good for growing magical apples, apparently”

“How did you even come up with the idea?”

“We didn’t. We just wanted that one guy who always talked about growing apples in north to go away. So he did… to a magic node”.

“Well, just hope this doesn’t attract unicorns”.





"Note: Black Minotaurs are significantly fiercer and more dangerous than their fawn-colored cousins!"

From the collected works of His Majesty's Advisor.

“We should have trained some of them ourselves, m’lord”

“Maybe we should have. But the task at hand is killing the ones we didn’t! And don’t let the word get to the guards at the Elven casino.”



“So this chest that appeared from thin air and crushed this man’s wife?”

“Yes, lord. Apparently magical treasures are just appearing all over the realm”

“Maybe the magic items, special that they are, are being displaced by Dremer explosions?"



…and as cherry on that cake, a war with Sol de Torvega dropped from the sky, too.