Magic: the Gathering
Chronicles, Volume 26
"Is this true, Viktor? Is this true? One of Elena's Hunters has declared his loyalty to us?"
Georgi was dumbfounded, shocked out of his mild, almost casual manner when Viktor was meeting with him in a quiet room in the castle of King Teramont on Bant. It was approaching evening, yet another fiery gold sunset taking place over the grassy hills dotted with tree clusters, small lakes, and Rhox monasteries. The rest of Viktor's friends were present, Makoto commenting on how long it had been that he had been here, having been in Elena's possession ever since going to Kamigawa to capture Ryusei, Devin's Key Creature.
Viktor wasn't going to back down if his grandfather disapproved, or even if the other Planeswalkers here disapproved. He took a deep breath of musty castle air. "Yes, grandfather. Epsilon has shattered his allegiance with Elena. He proved it by showing that his forehead emerald is broken, since those emeralds are the Hunters' link to Elena's power and influence. Plus, he helped us massacre Elena's ground forces at the Towabara Plain, and even let us capture Konda instead of capturing it himself. Thanks to him, we now have all five Key Creatures again."
Makoto held up his Konda card as emphasis, and Viktor resisted the temptation to touch his fingers to the Thorn Elemental card in his pocket. Five thin pieces of cardboard meant so much in this conflict! Georgi sighed deeply, running a hand over his deceptively youthful face. "I hope you accept the responsibility for this, Viktor," he warned his grandson. "Do you know what a betrayal by one as powerful as Epsilon would do to us at this stage? We've come too far to allow defeat now."
Viktor felt annoyed. "We have no other choice," he argued, feeling weird that he was arguing in a Hunter's defense. "Epsilon proved his loyalty, I already said it! He is working in our self-interest. He did say how he initially planned to make his own empire in Ravnica to counter Elena's, but he'd rather fight with us than have us conquered one at a time by Elena's Enslaved legions and the remaining Hunters. Alpha is still out there somewhere, and we never defeated Kappa, either."
Ashley, Kelly, Devin, and Makoto held their breath in anticipation after Viktor's words, anxious to see what Georgi would say. Then Georgi smiled.
"Excellent, Viktor!" he congratulated his grandson.
"Huh?"
"I knew you wouldn't make a decision like that unless you were absolutely certain about what you were doing," Georgi assured him. "And that you'd be willing to stand by your decision. I admit, I am still uneasy about calling Epsilon an ally, but you did what you had to, and I certainly look forward to seeing if Epsilon keeps his word. How can we contact him?"
Relieved, Viktor explained, "His base is on Ravnica, in Prahv, the capital building of the Azorius Guild. He's got a bunch of Azorius troopers there as well, and he wants to meet us in Dominaria when we're ready to carry out a joint operation."
Georgi considered this. "Well, if that's the case, then –" he started before Elspeth burst into the room and knocked aside the door in her anger. I'll never get used to seeing stuff like that, Viktor thought in a funny tone. Planeswalkers on the cards just barging into my room!
Elspeth waved a hand, an angry frown creasing her normally attractive features. "Bardon!" she demanded. "Is this true?"
"Is what true?" Georgi asked her mildly.
Elspeth actually stamped an armored foot down. "That one of the Defiled One's Hunters is allying himself with us?"
"Oh, that," Georgi nodded. "Yes, Elspeth, I can understand that you're upset about this. However, we have little other choice in the matter. We –"
"He's a betrayal waiting to happen," Elspeth argued. She absently gripped the hilt of her sword. "I've seen the terror and hate that such an act can bring, and would rather not see it again!"
"Yes, Elspeth. You were betrayed by others in your wandering before finding the refuge of honor and purity, Bant," Georgi appealed to her, and Viktor didn't recognize this fact from the player's guide bio about her but figured that the little bio couldn't cover her whole life.
"I would rather slay the beast right now," Elspeth growled.
Georgi understood. "Sorin, too, was slow to trust him," he added. "But the facts are with us. Epsilon must be allowed to help us, since storming Elena's hideout will not be easy at all. Epsilon may know the way to take her down more easily."
"Isn't the Defiled One's home the Minamo Academy on Kamigawa?" Elspeth asked.
Georgi shook his head. "That place has been abandoned by her," he said. "Enslaved creatures still roam about it, but Elena herself is hiding out on one of the other shards of Alara. Jace secured this information for us."
"Why is she there?" Kelly asked, confused.
"Apparently, she and Nicol Bolas have an understanding," Georgi said heavily. "I have not spoken to Bolas in some time, or seen him since, but apparently he's even weaker than when I last saw him. He tried to ram the five shards of Alara together to create a super-powerful Maelstrom of mana to draw upon and recharge his strength. At the same time, the armies of the five Shards would be engulfed in war, giving him cover. Elena has decided to hold Naya, Jund, and Esper in place and prevent the Maelstrom and deny Bolas what he wants."
"To keep him from becoming a powerful rival to her?" Viktor guessed.
"Indeed," Georgi nodded. "Her magic is keeping those three shards apart, and her death would not undo the spell's effect. In fact, she's the only one who can undo her own twisted magic: if Bolas were to kill her, he would condemn himself to die a painful, slow death as his life energy ebbed to nothing. Therefore, we have to get to her as soon as we can. If we weaken her enough, she may try to complete the Maelstrom and feed off if it herself, and Bolas could help us in that event. There's no guarantee, but it's worth a try. In the meantime, we have to weaken her defenses."
"How can we do that?" Viktor asked.
"Tezzeret found Kappa on Mirrodin," Georgi said. "That beast is devouring everything metal in sight, gaining strength and increasing his body size. Slay him before he becomes too powerful to defeat, all right? There isn't much time."
*o*o*o*o*
"Does anyone else smell rust?"
"Yes, Devin. We all smell the rust and metal of this world!"
"Well, just saying…"
"Hush, children," Tezzeret scolded Devin and Kelly, who had embarked on their usual verbal sparring upon reaching Mirrodin, the baffling plane of metal and flesh made one. Here, artifice and nature melded into a single whole, a world created by the Planeswalker Karn and the current stomping ground of the Hunter Kappa.
"What's our first move, Tezzeret?" Viktor inquired, who knew that Tezzeret was in his element here and Viktor was not. Here, Viktor could see that his party was standing on a plain of rolling steel and iron hills with assorted sheet-iron-like surfaces, like a welder did a sloppy job assembling the place. On patches of real dirt here, gray-green grasses grew in tufts and patches, with tiny aluminum bugs and lizards scampering about while blinkmoths wafted through the air. The hills here were on the edge of the Razor Fields, where thousands of acres of tall blade-grasses grew in their sweeping metal beauty. Then, to the right, there was the Tangle, a gigantic and deadly forest of copper trees home of the Tel-Jilad trolls, elves, and many species of wild beasts.
"Our first move is to find Kappa's tracks," Tezzeret explained, the Esper-born artificer setting off without warning. His smooth blue armor and etherium right arm seemed somehow at home here, and yet completely foreign and alien. Was that how the inhabitants of the Planes saw all the Planeswalkers? "It devours metal to replenish its strength, by what my analysis of it has told me."
"Hey. When did you study Kappa? You never met it," Viktor frowned, jogging to catch up to the artificer Planeswalker. The others hurried to catch up as well, with Gerbie freaking out at this "endless scrap yard" of a place.
Tezzeret gave Viktor a funny look. "I have met him before," he told Viktor. "He tried to infiltrate Esper at one point, seeking to Enslave my home."
"Whoa! I – I wasn't aware," Viktor said in awe. "You drove him out, though, didn't you?"
Tezzeret sighed deeply, closing his eyes. "Yes, at extreme cost," he recounted. "I was once a fugitive from Esper, having been chased off by the Seekers of Carmot. You recall that I found my way to Grixis after that? I would have become more involved with Nicol Bolas there had the Defiled One not began her Enslavement of the Multiverse, encouraging me to join my fellow Planeswalkers there. Anyway, being on Grixis taught me about mind control, and I was able to block Kappa's Enslavement process on Esper long enough to keep everyone on my side and fight it."
"Wait. You know how to suppress the Enslavement?" Viktor asked excitedly, aware that the Hunters, and Elena especially, could warp nearby creatures to Elena's will simply by being near them. "By being on Grixis?"
"I could tell that events would have led me in a different direction had Elena not appeared," Tezzeret went on. "I fear what would have become of me, but now I stand to play my part defending the Multiverse from the Defiled One. No, I can't liberate the Multiverse by myself; I am just one man, Planeswalker or otherwise. Rather, I can suppress Kappa's Enslavement process here and makes destroying him easier."
"I bet it has already started the process," Viktor added darkly.
"There are many unknown factors here, but we cannot afford to fail here," Tezzeret said. "Stay sharp, children of the cards."
"We're right behind you, Tezzeret," Ashley promised him.
"That is good," Tezzeret nodded approvingly. "But by now, we should have –"
He was cut off by a sudden voice. "Travelers! It comes! The Maw!"
"What?" Viktor frowned, seeing a Leonin rushing towards them, the lion-man having apparently run some way.
"I… am warning all who come too close," the Leonin panted, doubling over and wheezing past his canines. He was clearly not a warrior, but a messenger. His fearful eyes looked up at the humans. "The Maw approaches. Flee!"
"What is this Maw? Tell me!" Tezzeret demanded alertly.
The Leonin gasped for another breath, then pointed the direction Viktor's party had been heading towards. "Be you strangers?" he demanded. "It's here! Not the Levelers, but the grounds and seas themselves devouring all! The Maw!"
"Is he… crazy?" Ashley asked nervously as Gerbie retreated into her pocket.
"I've seen too many of those 'disaster flick' things at the apartment to want to see this," the Simic gerbil said firmly, and Ike was of the same idea.
Disaster flick or not, we shouldn't ignore this, Viktor thought. He asked the Leonin, "When did this Maw appear?"
"Perhaps… two weeks ago," the lion-man answered, and Viktor realized that it had to be related to Kappa! The artifact Hunter had been defeated on Jund and retreated here about two weeks ago, and he had to be at least partly responsible for whatever this Maw was.
"Then we're going. Come on, all," Viktor encouraged the others, setting off toward this Maw.
"Wait! Do you not value your lives?" the Leonin cried, flattening his ears in fear as he pursued the departing group.
"It's okay. We're here to help," Viktor assured the Leonin over his shoulder.
"Well… if you say so," the Leonin hesitated. "But -"
The Leonin was cut off when a long bulge snaked its way across the hills and rose into the air, the very hilltops splitting apart as a metal tentacle rose and thrashed upward, breaking the Leonin's bones and flinging him far into the air and far away.
Ashley yelped in terror as Tezzeret blanched, shocked by what he saw as much as everyone else. The giant metal tentacle, thick as a tree trunk, rose like a snake and whipped to the side, intending to thrash the kids the way it had that Leonin. Quick on the upkeep, Viktor cast his Creeping Mold card and the gray-green moss and spores ate away at the tentacle, making it flounder and miss. Viktor prepared to finish off the tentacle and demand answers from Tezzeret when the ground began to shake, quaking back and forth and throwing everyone off their feet and onto the hard ground.
"Whoa! What in…?" Makoto cried out, before Viktor's heart froze when he heard a deep rumble from underground, like a mammoth beast growling its anger and hunger to accompany the quakes. He fought to get back on his feet against the seething rumbles, everyone else looking terrified.
"There is something very wrong with this Plane!" Tezzeret glowered, staggering to his feet. "I can sense the unnatural vibes here; this is no natural disaster. Kappa's twisted magic is at work, and I believe he's tainted the whole Plane!"
"Can he Enslave an entire Plane?" Viktor questioned with a grunt, aware that the trembles were getting stronger. He almost fell over until Devin helped him up. "I haven't heard of that happening."
"Perhaps he – impossible! Beware!" Tezzeret shouted, cutting himself off when he was met with a horrifying sight. Viktor whipped his head to the left and saw one of the taller hills start to stretch and rise, as though swelling with a hot gas inside. The very ground groaned and strained with the cataclysm, and a distinct growl of rage rumbled in the ground before the hill swelled even more, splitting into several parts.
Into fingers. On a hand.
"The Plane's coming alive! Run!" Viktor shouted, and in a panic Devin summoned Predator Dragon and everyone hopped on board the dragon's back, the scaly beast taking flight without any hesitation – it too feared the unnatural ground here. At Devin's mental command, the Predator Dragon climbed higher into the air, banking to the left to swoop back to the rising hill in time to see it rise further out of the ground, splitting into an entire humanoid hand!
"Back away! You fool!" Tezzeret roared over the deafening sound of the hill stretching into an arm at Devin, and the boy pulled the Predator Dragon back and had it hover, flapping its wings to stay in place. The hill-hand was still rising, each finger over a hundred feet long and the arm rising to the elbow, bending forward as the fingers splayed to seize the relatively tiny Predator Dragon. A massive shadow passed over the Dragon and its mounts as the silvery, tsunami-like hand closed in to seize them and crush them in its grip.
That was quite enough, in Viktor and Devin's minds. Fed up with the Plane itself having its way, the Dragon backed out of the hand's grip, allowing the titanic hand to close on thin air as Creeping Mold was cast, amplified with Viktor's green mana aura. The spell formed a sizzling thick bolt of green-gray metal-eating mold, splattering onto the hand and spreading like blight, eating away the metal. Devin's Deconstruct spell aided the process further, and the spell forced apart the joints of the giant metal hand, weakening it further to the Creeping Mold.
"And I shall finish it!" Tezzeret shouted, as the hand threatened to overcome the two spells and renew its attack. He flung a boomerang-like arc of crackling, electric-blue mana at the hand and the bolt raced through it, breaking it apart again. Critically damaged, the hand slumped and fell apart, only to split into millions of tiny pieces.
"Hey. Are those Myrs?" Makoto asked, and he was right.
"Alpha Myrs! Millions of them!" Tezzeret shouted, and Devin got the Predator Dragon higher into the air as the Alpha Myrs pounced into the air and nearly caught the Dragon. Ashley's Wall of Denial formed a blue-gold shield that the charging Myrs slammed helplessly against, clawing at the slick magical surface with their metallic hands. Without warning, they broke through it, still raging at the kids on the Dragon.
"If that's how you want to play it, fine!" Devin cried before whipping out a new card. Viktor saw it and tried to shout a warning, only to be too late. "Echoing Ruin!"
The red spell boomed like a thunderclap, a bone-shuddering series of shock waves blasting from the card held high in its caster's hand. The artifact-wrecking spell blasted apart the Alpha Myrs in waves, their countless parts falling back to the ground.
"Yeah! They all have the same name, they all die!" Devin shouted in glee before fatigue overcame him and he fainted, overwhelmed from the enormous tax of casting that spell on so many artifacts at once. He slumped forward and his mana connection to the Predator Dragon was cut, making it wither. The Dragon screeched and fell, dissolving into red mana as it plummeted back to Mirrodin's still-quaking surface, and only Ashley's Withstand kept everyone alive as the Dragon's dying form dissolved away around them.
"Stupid! We don't over-use our spells!" Kelly scolded the limp Devin, swatting his head as he lay on the protective shield cast by the Withstand, sparing the kids from the quakes of the surface. Viktor ignored that scene and noticed instead that the Alpha Myr parts were falling to the metal ground, all right, but were being absorbed back into it as they fell, like they were fused back in. How was that possible? He asked.
"I cannot say," Tezzeret shook his head. "I have seen many of the wonders of Etherium on Esper, but this is a different Plane and we're dealing with unnatural magic."
"Then what should we do?" Viktor asked before someone else cut him off.
"I… eat! I… eat… all!" a loud, grating voice growled in a terrifying baritone, seeming to come from everywhere at once. Viktor whipped his head around, seeking the source of the voice. He thought he recognized the voice, and was re-affirmed when a dragon-like head came out of the ground a hundred feet away, extending on a long neck. The head was enormous, its two glowing green eyes staring down the kids above its sharp tooth-filled mouth. The head was made of countless assorted scrap metal parts, loosely fused to make a whole that was connected to the ground. Viktor saw a tiny thumb-sized emerald on the dragon head's forehead, the gem glowing bright green against the silver surface.
"Kappa! It is the Plane!" Viktor cried in realization, everything falling into place.
"Impossible," Tezzeret breathed in shock. "That cannot be… the Defiled One's servant…"
"Isn't just… corrupting the place," Devin gasped, waking up and crawling over to his friends. "We've got to destroy it. Or we're all dead!"
"I… eat! I… eat… all!" Kappa grated again, opening and closing its dragon mouth to form the words. Then it breathed a plume of hot, evaporated iron at the kids like fire.
Kelly's Wall of Bone regenerated itself enough times to hold back the seething attack and allow a quick escape, Viktor realizing that he'd have to go all out. His Simic Sky Swallower was cast into existence, the gigantic Leviathan eager to do battle once again, having acquired a taste for fighting Hunters ever since Beta. Viktor steered the Sky Swallower carefully, unsure how long the beast's hide could stand up to Kappa's molten breath – he would have to be careful attacking, and wait for Safe Passage to be used first.
Kappa was not willing to wait. Apparently enraged by the opposition it faced, and possessive of the Plane it was in the middle of eating and merging with, Kappa exhaled another breath of molten metal at the Sky Swallower. Ready this time, Ashley used Safe Passage just in time, casting a temporary angel who flapped her wings and parted the molten metal like water. Viktor urged the Sky Swallower forward and charged at Kappa's mouth, prepared to enchant his creature with an Oakenform until the Sky Swallower lurched and rumbled and hissed in pain and rage.
"Hey! What's wrong, big buy?" Devin asked the Sky Swallower in concern, kneeling to pat its thick hide before it lurched again, throwing all of its riders off balance. Kelly cast a quick Drag Down, tweaked in order to keep everyone on the Sky Swallower's back with swamp muck but not harm them. Secure, Viktor looked over the Sky Swallower's haunch and saw the ground below rolling and roiling like water about to boil, almost a sea-like movement. And as he watched, a tall spike shot out of the roiling metal hills and shot up right at the Sky Swallower, and Viktor quickly gave it a mental command to dodge.
"Kappa's trying to stab the Sky Swallower!" Viktor shouted over the din of both the Sky Swallower and Kappa roaring as he got the Simic beast moving to dodge the spike. The tall spire missed, thrusting through the air before sinking back into the hills. A second later, it came up again, grazing the Swallower's haunch.
"Where is that coming from? From inside the Plane?" Makoto speculated with a grunt as he and the others were tossed about in place from the Swallower's movements. Determined to get back on the offensive, Viktor ordered everyone to cast support creatures as he steered the Swallower back at Kappa's dragon-like head. Dodging another ground-spike, the Sky Swallower obeyed Viktor's order and charged at Kappa's head as its owner plated it with Oakenform armor to protect it. A Volcanic Dragon, Sengir Vampire, Mothrider Samurai, and Angel of Mercy flanked it, prepared for any ambushes Kappa set up.
Meanwhile, Kappa had its own idea of self-defense: before the Sky Swallower could reach the dragon head, the entire ground rose as a sheer wall, towering over the Swallower and forming an utter barricade, and thousands of spikes poked out of the metal surface like a bed of nails.
"Whoa! Turn back!" Viktor shouted at the Sky Swallower and it complied, snaking back the way it came as the wall moved forward to impale it. Stymied, the Kappa-wall launched all of its spikes, all of which morphed into metallic insects that buzzed towards the Sky Swallower in a swarm.
"Bug alert!" Gerbie joked as the thousands of eagle-sized insects swarmed about, their stingers each as big as a pencil. The defensive creatures all swung and hacked at the swarm but it was slow work, and for every insect that was broken a dozen more moved in to riddle the creatures with holes. Quickly, Viktor got Elvish Warrior into play and enchanted it with Flight of Fancy, giving it blue ethereal wings to keep it aloft. Equipping the Warrior with Trusty Machete, Viktor watched as the Elvish Warrior used its expert combat grace to down many of the metal insects, backed up by Tezzeret. Not impressed with the bugs, he clapped his hands together and parted them, releasing a hundred blue static bolts that fried the nearest insects around him, destroying them.
The ground rumbled again as the barrier wall fell and the dragon head was revealed again, watching the battle hungrily with its glowing eyes. Then, as though by mental command, the surviving bugs all flittered away from the defensive creatures and went to the Simic Sky Swallower's underbelly, out of reach.
"And what are they going to do?" Devin challenged Kappa. "The Swallower's got armor! Those stingers won't…"
There was a huge blast as every metal insect exploded at once from the Swallower's underbelly, apparently overloading their own energy cores to self-detonate. The resulting explosion tore a huge chunk out of the Sky Swallower's belly, injuring the beast and making it lose its ability to hover. It fell right toward the ground like a stone, and Viktor saw with horror that the ground was churning and splitting apart, forming a wide circular mouth large enough to devour the entire Sky Swallower. Thousands of human-sized teeth lined the mouth as molten metal seeped up from the depths, almost like saliva.
"And now we're going to be… eaten by a Plane," Devin complained faintly. "Just our luck."
"Hmmmmmm…" Gerbie pondered, watching the circular mouth form.
"Huh?" Viktor asked, hoping that the little gerbil had come up with a plan.
Gerbie pointed. "This looks like the pit creature from Return of the J –" he started before Ashley banished him to her pocket and zipped it almost all the way closed to allow air to breathe. The problem persisted, however, as the ravenous maw was still there and the Sky Swallower was getting close. The teeth began rotating on the mouth, going around faster and faster as the molten metal seeped higher up, washing over the teeth and making them glow red-hot.
Then, Tezzeret took action. Planting his feet firmly on the Sky Swallower's back, he conjured an aura of crackling blue, black, and white mana that made the hair on Viktor's arms stand up as Tezzeret charged up his spell. "What are you going to do?" Viktor asked in a rush.
"Save our hides! So we may yet destroy this abomination!" Tezzeret shouted over the rumbling of the giant mouth and the hungry roars of the dragon head. With a heave, Tezzeret slammed his palms onto the Simic Sky Swallower's wood-armored back, surging his power through it and making it twitch. As the mouth in the ground drew close, Tezzeret now stood and threw a bolt of his static electricity-like spell at the mouth, and at once the mouth seemed to glow for a minute right before the Simic Sky Swallower halted, floating in mid-air as though a giant, invisible net had caught it.
"What did you do?" Kelly asked Tezzeret in amazement.
"I altered the polarity of this beast and of the mouth," the Esper Planeswalker explained. "They will repel and the beast cannot fall or touch the mouth. It buys us enough time to –"
Tezzeret whipped his head around to see the dragon head lurching closer to the hovering Simic Sky Swallower, grating its hunger.
"I… eat! I… eat… all!" Kappa screeched, opening and closing the dragon-head mouth. With that, the dragon head snapped forward, intent on chomping down on everyone on the Sky Swallower.
"Change the head's polarity! To keep it away!" Viktor shouted as he and the others dodged the head's bite, the massive jaws closing on thin air. The Sengir Vampire, Mothrider Samurai, Angel of Mercy, and Elvish Warrior attacked the dragon head on their owners' command as Tezzeret charged up his spell, and Devin's Deconstruct and Kelly's Drag Down supported the creatures' attacks. The swamp of the Drag Down and the corrosive acids of the Deconstruct forced Kappa to buckle its dragon head, almost seeming to wince as the creatures struck its metal hide with heavy attacks.
"Now!" Viktor shouted, and Tezzeret fired his polarity-changing spell again, but Kappa was one step ahead of them. Viktor could have sworn that Kappa chuckled in its dragon-like voice as it detached a portion of its forehead and launched it forward, the plate taking the brunt of Tezzeret's polarity-altering spell. The plate was instantly altered, forced to move away from the same-charged Simic Sky Swallower. The plate zoomed away as though fired from cannon, but the rest of Kappa's dragon head was unaffected.
The creatures attacking the dragon head struck it again, but their luck had run out. Kappa pushed through Ashley's too-late Withstand spell and swung its head to ran the Sengir Vampire, forcing the Vampire to slam into the Angel of Mercy, knocking them both off-balance as they were crowded into each other. Before they could recover, Kappa re-adjusted the metal in its dragon head and shot out a long spike from its cheek, impaling both the Vampire and Angel like shish-kebab, killing both.
"Those spikes again!" Devin commented angrily as the dragon head advanced, pushing aside the Mothrider Samurai as it closed its jaws on the Elvish Warrior, biting it in half. Then, the head shot out another spike at the Mothrider Samurai. The Samurai dodged the attack, until a second spike shot out and impaled it. Viktor would have cast a support spell, but the spikes came out too fast, and it was hard to tell where they'd come from! There had to be a way…
"Maybe out Key Creatures?" Makoto suggested in a panic as Kappa's dragon head advanced on them, grating its eating manta again.
"Even against Delta or Beta, we didn't need them," Ashley reasoned as she cast a Wall of Denial to hold off the dragon head, Viktor's Vine Trellis reinforcing it. "They were stronger than Kappa and we beat them through our own strength and wits."
"But aren't the Key Creatures our trump cards, so to speak?" Devin protested. "I want to use Ryusei! And this guy ain't like how he was before, like on Jund. Kappa's becoming a Plane!"
"This abomination is an it, not a 'he'," Tezzeret growled. "Perhaps the Key Creatures could help, but their ultimate role is to destroy the Defiled One herself. Only the power of the Planeswalkers and the Key Creatures can destroy her for good, and if they die they do not return. Exercise caution."
"They won't come back like our other creatures, then?" Viktor asked, remembering how many times he had cast and re-cast his main creatures in his battles. Fighting Drake, Elvish Warrior, Assault Zeppelid, and even his Simic Sky Swallower had come back from death more than once, when his mana aura forced their return. It was too risky.
"Keep your Key Creatures in your decks," Viktor advised as Kappa's dragon head bashed at the combined wall. "Even if one dies, then all this is for nothing. We've got to defeat Kappa some other way!"
"Let's hope that way makes itself apparent," Devin said nervously as Kappa broke through the Wall of Denial and started to tear through the Vine Trellis. "Maybe our Zendikar cards?"
"Whatever it takes," Viktor said firmly as Kappa broke through the Trellis, its dragon head snaking forward.
"I… eat! I… eat… all!" Kappa said yet again as the ground around the base of its head began to contort far below. Extra metal from Mirrodin's surface flowed up Kappa's neck and head, reinforcing it. Viktor prepared to counter battering-ram tactics, but was taken aback as the extra metal bulged off of Kappa's head and formed various indigenous Mirrodin creatures, all of them falling onto the Sky Swallower's back, prepared to fight. Golems, Vedalken Hoverguards, Myrs, Tangle beasts, and more all charged in a small swarm as the Kappa head raised itself again, completing its task.
"It's not attacking us directly?" Viktor wondered as the dragon head rose into the air and roared hungrily as its minions charged across the Sky Swallower's back. There was no more time to waste, however: several Samurai marched from Makoto's position, drawing their katanas for battle. Viktor and Devin got their creatures onto the battlefield for the melee as Ashley's angels provided aerial support and Kelly's Darkness blinded the creatures and allowed the kids' creatures to attack first, scoring some quick kills. Viktor had forgotten how impressive Makoto's samurai creatures were as they expertly sliced apart the various metal creatures, taking few hits in return. Nagao, Bound by Honor beheaded a Myr and leaped from its corpse, landing on a golem's reaching arm and ran up that arm. Nagao leaped into the air again and spun around, his katana slicing off the golem's head and neck, landing as the headless beast collapsed and fell off the Simic Sky Swallower's back and into the giant mouth on the ground.
What's it doing now? Viktor wondered, watching the dragon head again as Kappa's minions were pushed back. The dragon head roared and the circular mouth churned, bad signs. The dragon head then snaked over to the circular mouth and crawled into it, the mouth eating the dragon head. Then, the entire Plane's surface shook again as the surface started to sink, dozens of smaller mouths appearing and chomping on the surface, almost like Kappa was eating itself. Then, Viktor saw that the surrounding ground came closer from miles away, and the mouths started eating all that ground ravenously, swallowing the metal. As the mouths worked, the ground below the Sky Swallower lurched upwards, swelling higher and higher.
"Kappa is eating more of the Plane and converting it!" Tezzeret gritted as his punch knocked apart a Myr that got too close. "See? Kappa draws the land around it to devour, spreading its power!"
"I… think you're right," Viktor realized with dread, seeing that even the creatures on the ground were devoured too. Then, when the ground was all eaten and re-spread across the ground in Kappa's control, Kappa re-formed the dragon head and approached the Simic Sky Swallower, bulging with excess metal once again. The metal became molten and dripped down, forming the creatures as the drops landed. These hundreds of creatures reinforced the original wave, and the kids' creatures were hard-pressed to fend off the second wave. Meanwhile, Kappa's dragon head yet again roared, "I… eat! I… eat… all!" and sank into the circular mouth once again, devouring bordering lands even faster than before, almost frantic.
I'll bet that this is all wearing it out, Viktor realized, casting an Assault Zeppelid. The act of eating and sending creatures at us exhausts its energy, so it eats more and attacks us again, making a cycle. Kappa won't stop eating until it has swallowed down the whole Plane! It won't stop unless… oh. I see.
"Viktor! Quit staring and help!" Kelly cried in a rush as Ashley's Arrow Volley Trap narrowly protected her from a golem attack, buying Devin time to flank the golems with a Giant Ambush Beetle.
"Oh… right!" Viktor agreed, getting a Fighting Drake out to help, rushing over to Kelly. "Listen! I think I know how to defeat Kappa. I will need your help, and certain cards."
"Which ones? What do you have planned?" Kelly asked testily, her Grixis Slavedriver acting as a bodyguard.
"I've figured out Kappa's mechanisms," Viktor told her over the din of combat. "It needs to eat more and more and add to its bulk to keep itself going. Its appetite has gone out of control, and this process is sped up by Kappa fighting us. All we need to do is reverse the process of eating and bulking up."
"How?"
"Do you have Vicious Hunger and Nausea with you?"
Kelly looked through her handful of black cards. "Yes, I've got them here," she said, picking them out of the stack as she grinned. "I think I see your pattern here. What are you going to use?"
"Twiddle, to reverse how Vicious Hunger will affect Kappa," Viktor told her, showing her that card: "Tap or untap target artifact, creature, or land."
"And make Kappa the reverse of hungry… make it feel bloated and over-full?" Kelly asked with amusement. "Along with Nausea?"
"There's no other way I can think of," Viktor admitted. "Kappa has nearly infinite warriors to fight us with; we're just five kids and a Planeswalker against all of Mirrodin. Time to get unconventional."
"We'll aim for… well, Kappa's everywhere," Kelly noted with amusement. "Let's try it."
"Return to the fight!" Tezzeret shouted at them, fending off a hoverguard squad with his magical attacks.
"Tezzeret! We're going to defeat Kappa with these cards. Cover us," Viktor told him, showing Tezzeret the cards he and Kelly assembled and outlining his plan. Tezzeret agreed to keep them protected during their plan, but was cut off when an artifact Juggernaut appeared, quite out of nowhere.
"What the hell! Juggernaut!" Devin cried in alarm.
"Just hold it off!" Viktor ordered him until the artifact Juggernaut plowed through everyone and hit Kelly before she could cast Vicious Hunger and Nausea on Kappa. Her charcoal-black mana aura protected her, but her spells were knocked askew.
"Hang on!" Viktor exclaimed before casting Creeping Mold, the molds eating away at the Juggernaut. Still burning away, the beast swung around and hit Viktor too, before he could get Vine Trellis out. The wheeled monster rolled forward to crush him, still being dissolved, before Tezzeret leaped on top of it and broke it apart with his Etherium arm.
"Rid us of this monster," Tezzeret said simply before leaping away, and Viktor helped Kelly up before they got their spells cast at last. A purple, wavy strand of mana from her Vicious Hunger card and Viktor cast his Twiddle, his blue spell warping and twisting Kelly's own spell. At the same time as the warped hunger bolt hit a metal hill, Kelly added her Nausea to the mix, a cloud of black dust settling on the landscape.
It worked: Kappa lurched again, the hills twisting and gurgling with discomfort and agony as the spells took their effects. The giant dragon head roared, working its jaws in confusion and sickness.
"I… eat! I…eat… all!" Kappa rumbled, even though its body thought otherwise. The mouths on the hills began to twist and flounder, starting to regurgitate vast amounts of partly digested metal and artifact creatures all over the hills. Even the dragon head twitched and opened its mouth as countless hunks of metal fell out in a waterfall, the metal on its neck falling away and melting across the hills. The giant circular mouth lurched upward, the teeth starting to gnash as the mouth fell apart, no longer desired by its owner.
The artifact creatures on the Simic Sky Swallower's back all hesitated, feeling their owner's pain; in fact, it was accurate to say that they were a part of Kappa's flesh, operating independently. Either way, they stopped fighting and began to howl and writhe in agony, feeling their master's sickness. They began to melt as the hills also softened, melting together and creating massing chaos.
"Whoa! Are you puking Kappa to death?" Devin cried in disbelief, watching the spectacle.
"Hey. Whatever it takes, right?" Kelly asked him.
"Yeah... I know how to appreciate creativity," Devin grinned. There was no more need to worry: overcome by its reverse-hunger, Kappa was forced to relinquish its entire Plane-body, falling apart and melting everywhere at once. The dragon head was crumbling, and barely had the energy to reach for the hovering Simic Sky Swallower before slumping onto the Sky Swallower's back, reduced to just resting there and staring at the kids.
"I... eat. I... eat... all," Kappa moaned, the dragon head's mouth struggling to imitate the words with its mouth before the head and neck collapsed into millions of pieces, the eyes' glow fading. Not wasting a second, Tezzeret jumped high into the air and snatched the plate on the dragon head that contained Kappa's forehead emerald and returned to the Sky Swallower's back, holding it on his open hand.
"We have claimed our prize," the Etherium Planeswalker declared, closing his fist on the emerald. "See how our foe falls apart?"
"It's more like a cataclysm," Kelly commented, seeing the landscape around her twisting and contorting upon Kappa's death throes, the result of her and Viktor's handiwork. At last, the landscape became still, the hills askew and countless pieces of debris sticking out of the ground like a junkyard, many of them melded onto the landscape. Other parts still glowed molten hot, since they had come from underground in Kappa's stomach-like regions. All of the artifact creatures that had made up part of Kappa's body lay dead, some of them half-fused onto the metallic rubble, forever stuck.
Devin exhaled. "Dude! We got him. Kappa is down!"
"It, not he," Kelly reminded him. "Kappa was genderless and even less of a living thing than the other Hunters like Beta and Delta." Then she grinned despite her weariness. "But you're right. I'm glad this is over."
"Though our final confrontation with the Defiled One awaits," Tezzeret reminded them heavily. "She is most likely near the partial Maelstrom at the Shards of Alara, feeding off its power. Nicol Bolas is probably there, too, unwilling to leave the investment he made in the Defiled One's plans. His original ambitions depend on her getting her way. Alpha, the most powerful Hunter, will be there too. It will be a difficult confrontation."
Gerbie fought his way out of Ashley's pocket and pounced through the air to land on Tezzeret's face, hanging on with his claws. "Why are you such a downer, metal boy?" the gerbil complained. "Cheer up! We beat the living... the artifact daylights out of Kappa!"
"Get off me, creature," Tezzeret snapped, pulling Gerbie off his face and holding him at eye level. The Simic pet squirmed.
"Oi! Set me down so I can show you what I'm really made of," Gerbie challenged him before Tezzeret materialized an Etherium cage to trap Gerbie in, the construction being curving and graceful in design but sturdy too.
"Gerbie!" Ashley cried in concern, rushing forth to take back her pet as he struggled in the cage.
"Poor me. I'm trapped!" Gerbie said as as joke, Ashley fumbling with the cage to get him out.
"Weak, dude," Ike commented from Viktor's pocket, yawning widely.
"Silence," Viktor ordered his pet, and Devin's Deconstruct freed Gerbie.
"So! Are we gonna meet up at Bant and report our victory and party till dawn?" the Simic pet asked excitedly, once Ashley held him close to her chest to protect him from Tezzeret.
"Only the former," Tezzeret nodded. "Let us go. The Defiled One's Enslavement is growing by the second, and her personal strength is growing. Time is not on our side."
The group departed the twisted Plane of Mirrodin with Viktor and the others' teleport power from their Key Creature cards, with Kappa's emerald held tight in Tezzeret's fist.