Book 5 - Chapter 93 Nessus, the Parasite (1/2)

The Caliph’s sudden appearance had caught everyone off guard.

One possibility struck Cloudhawk. Perhaps while unconscious in Nox, Judas, the Khan and Abaddon discovered some way to force him to open interdimensional space. There they hid a copy of the Caliph and a number of Black Knights for this very moment.

He didn’t know how Judas had managed it, but it was clear this was a deliberate, well-planned ambush. The Khan of Evernight was the distraction, out in the open, while Abaddon waited in the shadows.

Cloudhawk’s intention had been to use his powers in a desperate attack. Little did he know Abaddon and the Black Knights lurked in wait. When he engaged the Demon King’s power they emerged, much to even Cloudhawk’s surprise. But his confusion was a hundred fold more intense for the Silverwing Monarch.

Abaddon was a demon of considerable strength. Pairing that with a sneak attack he was not prepared for, the king’s defenses were overcome.

A cavity was left from where the sand spear had pierced him, a gaping opening from front to back. Residual power from the Gospel of Sand was eroding his internal organs, turning them to grit. A wound this grievous was more than any normal human could survive.

The Silverwing Monarch was an entity that defied common sense, however even he could not avoid the consequences of such trauma.

While the Black Knights blocked Imperia’s Highblood, the Khan hacked his sabers of light at the city’s control center. The strange tree had the capacity to regrow after damage, but at least for the time being its capabilities were severed. Blocked from his limitless source of energy and facing three mighty foes, even the Silverwing Monarch was out of his depth.

It had all happened so quickly!

The king’s third eye bulged even wider, splitting the bones of his skull. A fierce depth of wrath poured from the beleaguered Monarch.

It was answered with hissing laughter from Abaddon. “Predecessor Nessus is strong. However, even after assuming the form of a legendary demonhunter, even after consuming and assimilating his power, even with my king’s blood crystal keeping this skin suit alive and drinking up the energies of all your subjects – you are still merely a fiend lapping at the heels of a former owner. A servant who wishes to steal his master’s power. That is an offense I will not tolerate...”

That was the secret! The Silverwing Monarch wasn’t himself, or a demon, or a god. He was more like Oddball, an unholy beast with some old connection to the Demon King. A pet, like Cloudhawk and Oddball.

Of course the power and grade of Nessus was a great deal superior to the likes of Oddball. It derived its power from what it attached to – essentially a parasite. It took over the Legendary Demonhunter’s body, and used the Demon King’s blood crystal to keep it alive. Then it used that same power to siphon power from others and turn them into imperfect doppelgangers.

If the Khan had not severed his connection with the blood crystal, Nessus would be impossible to defeat. Through the blood crystal it could keep healing this puppet body it had inhabited. But without this effective immortality, and with its mighty psychic energies damaged by Cloudhawk, the indomitable position of the Silverwing Monarch was quickly eroding.

No doubt about it, this was the best – and only – moment to overcome the Silverwing Monarch!

Silver wings thrust out wide, sending a thousand blades of cutting wind through the chamber. While maintaining this assault it rose through the air through an opening the Temple created for him in the ceiling, attempting to escape.

Abaddon and the Khan moved to stop it. Only, the king’s area-wide assault was too intense. The two of them were not enough.

The Khan’s eyes snapped to Cloudhawk. “Many powerful elite live in Imperia. If he escapes we lose our chance to end him. You will also lose your only chance to live. Why do you hesitate?”

Indeed there was conflict in Cloudhawk’s heart. It was obvious he had been used, a pawn under the control of Judas whose aim was to kill Nessus. Once this creature was felled Imperia would be thrown into chaos. Nox would come to take over and there was no way to know the fate of the Silver Kingdom after that. And yet a stream of faces flashed across his memory; Selene, Dawn, Gabriel, the old drunk and more… he made up his mind. More important than whether Nessus deserved to die, Cloudhawk had to live.

He had to make it back home!

Reality rippled. In a blink he was a thousand meters in the air, right in front of Nessus. Scarlet fires smoldered in the depths of his eyes; a sign of his imminent, all-out assault.

But Nessus was not any ordinary creature.

The Silverwing Monarch’s mouth stretched open, the skin splitting as it distended well passed its ears. From the depths of a ruined throat came a plume of angry fire.

It poured forth thick as lava. The heat from it made the air corrugate. Cloudhawk curled his gauntleted left hand into a fist and, a halo of light emerging around it, he thrust it forward..

Nessus’ coagulated fires were drawn into the gauntlet’s pale light and what remained scattered through the air. Some it splashed onto Cloudhawk’s body and scalded deep grooves in his flesh, but these were not fatal to him. At the same time, the Silverwing Monarch was still pelting the Khan and Abaddon with beams of light below.

Three against one and he still wasn’t at a serious disadvantage. But flaws were starting to appear!

Ignoring the risks of drawing too much energy, Cloudhawk continued to defend himself with the gauntlet and reached out with his right hand. Streaks of silver light were summoned from his palm as the Silver Serpents emerged. Dancing between them were motes of green flame. All together they were like the head of a mighty dragon, breathing Castigation Fire. As the power slammed into the king’s left wing those silver feathers began to melt away.

The foul green flames quickly spread.

Fear and madness burned in Nessus’ eyes. Of course it recognized this power, he’d encountered it a thousand years ago during the Great War. It was the power of a great demon Elder. Now, somehow, it was under the command of this mortal worm.

Fires that raged so long as one’s will remained! So long as Cloudhawk didn’t let up, those fires would continue until there was nothing left of the Silverwing Monarch.

Nessus’ puppet roared and snapped off half of its wing before the fires could spread further. It was blacked in front by Cloudhawk and behind by the Khan and Abaddon. With each passing moment this body it’d worked so hard to perfect was being cut apart. Things had turned dire very quickly.

But it wouldn’t give up. A strange and monstrous scene followed as the king’s head split fully in half.

A hideous thing clawed out from the remains of the skull. It had nine tentacle arms, like some sort of devilish octopus, and one enormous eye. Smaller feelers writhed on the underside of these tentacles, groping at whatever was close. Half of this creature’s body heaved from the top of the king’s ruined head. The remainder of it was still lodged in the meat puppet, controlling it from within.