God Rising

Chapter 93

Written by: AtheistBasementDragon

Edited by: The Usual Gang of Drunken Perverted Idiots

AN: Bonus double release day. I won't be doing many of these in the near future...BUT I will make you an offer. If BD giving dot org raises $100 in charitable donations by Tuesday...I'll do another double release day. If it doesn't...well no big deal, I'll just write one chapter at a time, the story isn't being held hostage, I'll keep writing and publishing chapters regularly. Maybe 'a little' more slowly since my schedule will shift next week, but a hundred times faster than most. Of course if you want to be slave drivers, well everybody wins. :) Anyway, on with the show!

...Commonton…

Bodies lay everywhere, what scraps of ground and stone not covered in bodies were soaked red as if some painter had decided the dirt should now be colored a dark crimson instead of the verdant green or warmth of brown. Though the victory was theirs, it had not come without a steep cost. Robel went to where he had last seen Gilcrest. He heaved body after body out of the way, dragging some because there was simply no room nearby to relocate them.

Eventually he found him. Gilcrest was dead, a shocked look still on his face as if he could not believe it had happened. A deep sword wound in his stomach just below where upper and lower armor met. That tiny gap, a single lucky thrust, and his friend was gone.

Robel went down to his knees beside the body. He looked into the pale face of his friend, and then slowly, traced two fingers down his forehead until he reached the eyes. Those he grazed ever so gently, and closed them as if Gilcrest had not died, but only gone to sleep.

Surrounded by the dead, he found he only possessed enough feeling in the ocean of his soul to care for one. His hand rested on the armor, heedless of the stains of blood that coated it. Those who had killed him had not survived to celebrate; he, as Gascon before him, had made them pay a terrible price for achieving their desired end. For all the good it had done them, they had lost anyway, died anyway, and gained nothing for their sacrifices. The only thing to change was that Robel now had someone to mourn.

He stayed on his knees there, slumped slightly forward over the body for a very long time. Eventually a multi-headed snake woman came to him, touched his shoulder, and the heads spoke in unison. "He wasss your friend?" She asked.

Robel nodded. "One of the best, and a comrade." He said in a numb, broken voice.

The snake woman looked around, seeing the price that Gilcrest had made them pay for taking his life, "He fought well, many live becaussse of him, of that I am sure."

Robel could barely nod. "That doesn't lessen the ache." He said, not looking up.

"No, but at leassst it was not for nothing, and it wasss hisss choice to the lasssst." She said.

Robel forced a quiet nod.

"What wasss his name?" She asked sympathetically.

"Gilcrest. Gilcrest of Hoburns." Robel said proudly.

"I have a clutch of young in thisss town, had thossse men made it passst Gilcrest of Hoburnsss, they would have killed my young in their nessst. When they grow old enough to underssstand, I will tell my young of the courage of Gilcressst of Hoburnsss, the human who sacrificed his life to sssave them. And I will tell them that he wasss a man worth mourning. I am sssorry for your losss." The snakeman female said.

"Thank you." Robel said sincerely, looking away from the boyish freckled face of the young Gilcrest. His sandy hair was matted with blood, his face displayed a dozen wounds, it was impossible to accept that he was a man grown, he looked so young still. When the snakeman female had left, he looked one last time at the body of his friend, and stood slowly to his feet. He held the gaze as his hand broke contact with the corpse, then he looked up and turned away.

The wounded and the dead were already being tended to. There were no prisoners to speak of, just a handful, literally only five. A few who had fallen and been knocked out when they were trampled by their fellows during the rout.

A large bafolk warrior approached Robel, "Sir, what are your orders?" He asked.

"Strip the dead of anything we can use. I want everyone who can wear armor and bear a weapon ready to move, I don't expect many survivors among the attacking force, but whether there are or not changes nothing." Robel said, he gritting his teeth and blinking back tears.

"Wrap th-the bodies and prepare them for disposal. For those who are Black Justice, gather the last wishes. I expect there will be those willing to offer up their bodies for the turning, and that should augment our numbers. The flesh… the flesh we will set to the pyre and send their spirits skyward with the smoke. I don't know how demihumans tend to the dead, but you may do with them as your customs dictate and we will not interfere." He started to clench his fists.

"Lost someone?" The bafolk asked.

"I did." He replied.

"He make them pay a price?" The bafolk asked.

"A heavy one." Robel replied.

"Is that good enough?" The bafolk pressed.

Robel shook his head fiercely. "Only an end to this war will be enough for me." He said emphatically.

"We can't end it from here." The bafolk added.

"I know." Robel answered.

"So you plan on having us leave, don't you?" He asked.

"Yes, everyone who can bear a weapon, we're going to go west. We'll check the area for survivors, then we're going to Prart." Robel said.

"What about here?" The bafolk asked.

"If the army meant to go this direction is crushed, it will be months before they can raise another, and if they are crushed at Prart, they'll never get the chance to do it." Robel said firmly.

The bafolk scratched its long nose and huffed through it, "I never thought I'd see the day when we'd be invading a human nation to help humans."

"Maybe not." Robel said, and pointed to the body of Gilcrest. "But I never thought I'd see humans die for bafolk, or any other demihumans, yet there is the proof of it. He was barely old enough to be called a man, but he fought like a hero, and he died as one. Now because of him, and a lot of others like him, a lot of demihuman children are going to grow up." Robel's voice, given the wrong inflection, might have been thought to be an accusation, or a rebuke, or a condemnation.

However it was obviously none of those things. His voice carried a deep well of sadness that cut to the heart of the demihuman in front of him. "Yeah." The bafolk said, and pointed to the body of one of his own species not too far away from where Gilcrest lay. "I wonder if they saw one another, urged each other on, shared a look of final understanding, saw each other die, tried to help one another, or perhaps neither saw anything but the enemy around them." He shook his large goat head and walked over to where the bafolk lay.

"I didn't know this one, but he died for me anyway. We're a warrior people you know, we're used to fighting, it's what we've always done." He looked up to Robel, "But rarely have we ever had a reason to actually do it, it was just how things were, it was all we knew. Then the Sorcerer King took over, ended the old ways, we ate good food without fear, nobody could steal from another, and the ceaseless strife that tore us apart was just… ended." He took up a handful of bloodstained dirt and blew on it forcefully, it scattered to the winds from the force of his breath, and disappeared.

"Now here we are again, fighting another war, a war for a new world. Maybe they'll call it that when they write the history books, and as bad as this is, at least this war is 'for' something." The bafolk said, and walked away, "I'll go help with the bodies, you join us when you're ready." The demihuman said.

The next few hours were busy ones as the town took stock of what was lost, scouts rode out to search for the routed forces of Astraka. They found a great many bodies, they heard the cries of skeletons as prey was found, but the number of dead steadily decreased as they moved farther and farther away from Commonton.

When the scouts finally returned, most of the bodies of the demihumans and Black Justice fighters had been gathered and their fates determined.

There were no priests of the old gods available to tend to the bodies of Astraka's soldiers, and so they were taken to a field near Commonton that was used for farming, and buried there in a mass grave, so that their bodies would at least serve a purpose and increase the harvest yields in the days that would follow. It was not an especially solemn affair, the humans they buried had come to wreak havoc and woe on the town, they had come to kill, burn, and destroy. Nobody believed for a moment that the young or the old would be spared, so nobody objected when the bodies were buried in the way they were.

Then came the next task, disposal of the dead. Metal tags were attached to each of those humans and demihumans who chose to be 'Turned' and then the bodies were stacked together outside of the town. It was a very large number of them, requiring ample wood soaked with oil and pitch. The entire population of Commonton surrounded it, including those Black Justice members who had come in its defense.

Many people, human and nonhuman alike, chose to speak of the dead that they had lost. The witnessing of common mourning had done much to aid in the forging of new bonds between the disparate groups. It was not without irony that Robel considered that Astraka had effectively given him a new army that was even more mixed than the last one, and might be a better force for it.

Finally Robel, as the commander of the combined force, stepped forward. "We bled together, we suffered loss together, we gained victory together, we mourn together, and we celebrate the lives of those who bravely fell, together. That makes us one people, no matter what the old ways say. Now we commit their bodies to the flames, let their flesh burn away and return to the land that bore them. Let their spirits rise in smoke and flame, to watch over us and give us courage in the afterlife. They are heroes, martyrs, brothers and sisters, no matter if they are of a different flesh. Speak their names to the air one last time, that it be carried with their ashes to the everlasting sky." His voice was bold and confident, but as he came to the end of his words, he choked on them, his pain was audible, and nor was he alone in feeling it. The night cloaked the faces of many, but his was wreathed in light and dancing shadows from the torch he held.

When the last word was said of his final eulogy for the dead, he lowered the torch to the wood, and fire leaped up as it caught the rich fuel, then it raced along the wood beneath the bodies as if it were trying to escape from his gaze.

Soon the flames were rising high, as if they sought to lick at the sky itself. The bodies were slowly consumed as names were intoned by those who loved the dead. Nobody moved but to look at the pyre, or their neighbors, or to lift their eyes up as ashes began to rise higher and higher, taken up by the wind and carried away. Names were said in reverential whispers by their survivors, as if trying to call their ashes back from the sky, to reform their bodies, and return them to life… or perhaps to send them off, saying farewell to old friends or family. In this, all living flesh stood united. "Gilcrest." Robel said softly, so that only he could hear. His memory flashed back to the youthful smile, the freckled face, the sandy hair. The enthusiastic spirit that drove him to finish the work of his mentor, Gascon, and drove him to fight right to the last. He cast the torch into the heart of the flames, and looked up silently as whatever was left of him, was carried away forever.

It took hours for the flesh to be burned away, leaving only the skeletons.

Those who had chosen to be 'turned' were removed and laid out together, and the priests went to work immediately, adding to their forces.

Those who had chosen 'not' to be turned, had their bones incinerated by the few available magic casters who could create fire hot enough to reduce them to ashes.

Finally it was over and done with, the dead were gone, the undead were ready, and the living were beyond the point of exhaustion. "One day's rest for all, minimal guard on the walls for security, but for now, I think we all need sleep. Tonight we feast and prepare to move, we will take the fight to Astraka and remind him of what happens when he sends his armies east!" Robel shouted those orders, and was met by raised weapons and thunderous cheers.

After all that, there was nothing left of him but the will to get somewhere safe to collapse. He made it to his bed, and fell down to slumber, too tired to even undress himself. He'd be uncomfortable when he woke up, but at that moment in time, he was well beyond caring about how 'comfortable' he may or may not be. All he wanted to do, all he could do was let his head hit the pillow, close his eyes, and let the darkness carry him away to dreams where he did not need to think or feel anything anymore.

...Argland Council State…

The Platinum Dragon Lord read over the document. "So he was serious." He said to his comrades.

"Apparently so." The wyrm dragon lord said.

"So we're really, as a neutral state, going to hold trials for war criminals?" The Blue Sky Dragon Lord said, shaking his head in disbelief.

"I don't think we really have a choice, we're the only neutral state left in the conflict, the only alternative would be to reach much farther east to the Karnasus City State Alliance or the Minotaur kingdom. He's already taken the Understone Empire and gotten the Dark Elves to unite into a single kingdom which… has sworn itself to him." The Platinum Dragon Lord said with a voice of resignation.

"How many are there so far?" The Wyrm Dragon Lord asked.

"I don't have a total count yet, but the report we got suggests that there are a great many, and more will be coming before the war ends." The Blue Sky Dragon Lord said, more than a little on edge.

"He's not going to charge the whole country is he?" The Obsidian Dragon Lord asked incredulously.

"No. I don't think so, but based on what we know, we can make some estimates right at the outset. All slave breakers and traders operating from the start of the war, everybody overseeing the operation of brothels where slaves were used, every work camp operating using forced labor, and we know that General Enri has extended that to include the massive Latifundias that haven't shut down or changed their operations. She did it at Ikari, she'll definitely do it at Crossroads, and Wheaton alone offers a bonanza of such places." The Platinum Dragon Lord proposed.

"I think we can probably include at least some of the temples in that list, and definitely most of, if not all the Cardinals, depending on their individual conduct. Other than that though, damn, this might as well be half the country. If he plans on asking for the death penalty, then quite frankly he might very well depopulate almost the entire Slane Theocracy." The Obsidian Dragon Lord pointed out.

"And we'll have done the killing for him, therefore there can only be two villains and neither of them is he. The Slane Theocracy for its… many… many war crimes, and us, for essentially wiping out that half of the population considered to be guilty in any reasonable trial. Thus we become the genocidal ones to our neighbors, not he." The Platinum Dragon Lord said and lowered his head, "The cunning of this being surpasses anything I have ever encountered in my countless years of life."

The rest of the dragon lords nodded their agreement. "We would have to count ourselves lucky if other nations did not begin to fear us, or even invade and force us into a war. If he lent such forces aid, he could take over our country by proxy, and there is little we could do. We simply do not have the power to match this being, nor do we have the cunning to outmaneuver him in politics." The Diamond Dragon Lord added.

"Perhaps we agree to hold the trials, but on the condition that the death penalty is removed as an option except for certain types of crimes?" The Obsidian Dragon Lord proposed hesitantly.

"Then we become the leaders who care not for justice, and when their deeds become public knowledge and we let them go or give them sentences that are not befitting their crimes, we appear to be hostile to justice or at least not care about the lives of non-dragons. Our rule works because our people believe in us. I could easily see this spiralling out of control into a civil war if the right strings are pulled, and we all know he could pull them." The Platinum Dragon Lord said with increased frustration in his voice.

"Damn it all!" The Obsidian Dragon Lord said.

"Damn it all!" The rest of the council echoed.

"Alright, since we are presented with a door that we must pass through, we should do so at our own pace. We will craft a system of penalties that allows us to appear to provide justice without having to commit genocide on the Slane Theocracy along the way. But before we begin to work on that, I assume we are all in agreement on two things?" The Platinum Dragon Lord said, they looked at him in anticipation of what he had to say next.

"First, that we are all better off without the Slane Theocracy around." He said, to a chorus of affirming nods and enthusiastic variations on the word 'yes'.

"Second," he said, "we must continue to make it our national policy to avoid antagonizing the genius to our south, and push the most stable and favorable terms we can without completely giving up our independence along the way."

This yielded the same response from the council as the first statement.

"Alright, then let us get to work." The Platinum Dragon Lord said with resignation.

...Nazarick…

"Or that is more or less what I imagine was happening in the Argland Council State." Demiurge said to a fascinated Vanysa.

"Remarkable, when did you realize that this was his plan, Demiurge?" The erinyes said, her wings shook happily and her sharp talons clasped together, interlocking as if in prayer, while her storm gray eyes shone admiringly.

"When he asked me offhand what I thought about sending a letter to the Argland Council state to ask them to conduct the war crimes trials. He was 'obviously' just prompting me, to see if I had worked out his plan yet." Demiurge's head lowered and shook dejectedly. "I hadn't, not until that moment, after that it was a blinding flash of the obvious. I can never catch up to him." He said as he slumped back down at his desk.

"Demiurge…" Vanysa said gently as she approached and touched his cheek with a razor sharp talon, "None of us can do what he does, but there is nobody better at interpreting his will and understanding his plans than you, take heart in that. If your service is inadequate, then so is all of ours. Just be proud of what you can manage for our god, and know he will not demand more of us than we can offer… and of course…" She lowered herself to look him in the eyes, "always strive to offer more. Now what say we get back to working on those heads, I think I have an idea on how we can create a blood renewal system."

Demiurge perked up, "Alright, yes, let's do that. I may never reach his heights, but I can always strive to fly higher. Let's get back to work." He said, and he watched as Vanysa began to sketch out a design on a piece of paper in front of him.