Rot and Gold 1 – Titans and Tactics

The Celestial Devourer broke through the surface. A cosmic crocodile, a water dragon of the universe limited to the space within the overlapping Protected Space. Next to Tiamat’s filth, Stirwin looked twice as magnificent, gold-scaled, silver-bellied, and equipped with gargantuan teeth. A long front leg grabbed Tiamat by the throat, only for the two titanic dragons to lock jaws. Corrupted water spewed from one side, solar plasma from the other, and the resulting steam explosion **** them apart.

Emrik paled at the sight. That was all. The man was a thousand levels below this clash. Just being too close to it could have killed him and just about anyone else on the island. Two entities above most gods were clashing and all there was in these above average Abyssals was mild fear.

‘One has to admire the indomitability of the human spirit,’ John thought. Could he have been this brave in the face of absolute destruction? ‘I suppose I used to be,’ he decided to give himself that much credit. He was weak once, as long and far away that was, and he still had chosen to do everything he had done so far.

“You can just… call that?” one of the planners around asked.

“No.” John put the item he had taken with him away, letting people guess whether it had done anything in the first place. “I need 100 million Maybel for that trick. The Mana Storage of the Guild Hall is empty now.”

The clashes between the goddess of chaos and Celestial Devourer continued violently. It was several kilometres away, a distance that their size made a mockery of. To them, the 10 kilometres the Hudson Barrier was across might as well have been the equivalent of a boxing ring.

Stirwin caught Tiamat by the shoulder. The black dragon of entropy laughed in pain, coiling her profane form around her opponent. Her ribs extended as jutting spears, stabbing through belly scales. Super-heated essence dripped into the river, creating pillars of steam. In an angry knot, the two dragons rolled into the Lorylim-infested city.

The light always emanating from Stirwin created shifting silhouettes in the spores. At times, the shapes made no sense whatsoever. At others, the side profiles were clear. Silver seekers scattered outwards, piercing Tiamat’s hide in several spots. She retaliated with a swipe across Stirwin’s chest.

This was not like the battle against Enki’s corrupted form. Stirwin was a magnificent beast. Tiamat was his equal in her vileness. She must have considered herself to have a chance, having encountered the Celestial Devourer before. She was correct in assumption. Not because Tiamat’s imperfect avatar could defeat Stirwin, but because she didn’t need to. Being one had never been the strength of Mother Chaos, not in life and certainly not in her cling to it.

“Momo, go help him. Nathalia, I want you to focus on breaking the charge.” He looked at the Flame of Destruction. “You can do that, for me.”

It was not a question. It was a statement to the trust he had in her. Nathalia gave him a slow nod, before growing wings of molten membrane and taking to the air. Momo had already taken off, but was quickly overtaken by the burning goddess.

Stirwin and Tiamat had emerged from the spire clouds again. Ramming his enormous bulk into the stomach of the goddess of chaos, the Celestial Devourer carried her back to the water, crashing her into it. Unfathomable amounts of water were displaced in that instant.

It was the largest and latest of waves caused by the fight that was now rolling towards the Guild Hall. Rancid waves, filled to the brim with the Lorylim matter that had loosened from Tiamat’s avatar. The spore clouds meandered along as well, forming spiralling tendrils, reaching out towards from the mould-covered city from every direction.

The sea boiled once more. This time it was not a flash. Magma cooled into obsidian hurdles in the path of the waves, as Nathalia, now in her godly form, bombarded the Lorylim within with fire and brimstone.

It wasn’t enough to stop the attacks. Mighty as she was, Nathalia was only one and the wave picked up speed as it went. Creatures within accelerated, foaming the water with grey slime. Tendrils emerged from it, lashing at the dragoness, pulling her into a melee with two Manifestations of Filth. The gargantuan water elementals together could not overpower Nathalia. As they fought, the water continued on.

“Should I give the deployment order?” Chemilia asked.

John glanced at her. It was strange to think how long they had been working together now. She was up here, his second in command in absence of any haremette. The woman with the light-pink hair was the greatest tactical mind in his conventional military. Her husband was down there, to lead the charge of the ground troops. Elu and James were also down there, one leading the troops of the Hidden Tradition, the other the middleman between reinforcements and frontline.

“Not yet,” he responded.

The wave swept through the edge of the Guild Hall. There was a very clear ‘break’ in the wave as it went from one Illusion Barrier into the other. Ultimately, the filth continued on without pause, turning the previously clear water into nothing. The great clams that John had seeded in the waters jumped outwards, crested the waves, their shells turned into the snapping maws of the wave.

“Now?” Chemilia asked, impatiently.

“No. Wait until we know where the enemy will concentrate their attack,” John insisted.

Stone splintered as water slammed into the sides of the mountains. The ring that John had put around the Guild Hall took the majority of the brunt **** of the attack. Water spilled over the ridges like waves from a pool. More worrisome was what made it in through the gaps left between the mountains, sweeping into the channel at a catastrophic pace. The majority of that went into the needle-like Darkspine, the rocky terrain of the Shadow Island. What remained swept on towards Silicate Island in the north of the Guild Hall and the Military District in the west.

“Looks like we have three fronts?” Chemilia suggested. “Shadow Island, Military and northern Production District?

“The Lorylim are chaotic, not stupid,” John said and turned to look up at Lady Liberty.

The renovated statue stood tall and proud above them all, holding the torch of freedom up high. What had been metal and floodlights in the mundane space, John had changed to a fire absorbing crystal of prestigious size for Salamander’s birthday. A crystal that the apocalypse elemental had fed readily and often, making the torch flicker in Fusion’s nights.

A battery of that size was worth a lot in the hands of three of the most genius crafters the world had ever known.

The railing around the torch had been turned into an actual railing. A massive magnifying lens was put in place, covered in runes that further amplified the draw of energy from the crystal. Fourteen beams of fire were focused into seven and seven were focused into the Rose of Artifice. The petals of the sophisticated invention quivered. The ruby gem in the middle glowed from within.

The torch of freedom lit up bright in the day. The Rose of Artifice unleashed the energy channelled. A beam of concentrated red, white and blue pierced the heavens, incinerating the wave that was sweeping towards the Silicate Island. Radiating heat could be felt where John stood for the seconds the beam persisted. When it petered out, it turned thinner until it finally vanished.

Hailey: we can do that about once every thirty minutes or until something breaks.

“See, that’s one front less we have to worry about,” John managed to get out a joke, while dismissing the Harem Comms window. It fell flat with the people around. Abyssals were hardy of mind, but in the face of powers like this, even the elite’s humour was muted. “And now we see the real goal.”

The wave that had rolled down the western channel continued past the walls of the Military District. Horrifically deformed elementals and flesh monsters crawled up the fortifications. A distraction **** while the rest of Tiamat’s shed pieces continued on towards the Water island. That was the move that John had anticipated. Water elementals were the easiest for Tiamat to corrupt, courtesy of her connection to saltwater.

“Our primary fronts are the Shadow Island and the Water Island. Deploy the initial response **** at the chokepoints now.”

“Yes, Sir!” Chemilia declared, hasting back into the building to retake her spot at the active measurements.

John would join her in a moment. He had use out there. He had more use back here. Since the day he had decided to follow the summoner path, he had put himself voluntarily into the position of commander. Even if his arsenal had grown tremendously since, that was where he was the most useful to this day.

He only lingered to give those members of the military leadership with him a stern look. It was an attempt at looking regal, to fill those shoes he had now put on himself. He loved and hated how right it felt that all of their attention lay with him. “We will not out-coordinate the hivemind,” he told them blatantly. “Our answers will be reactive, our strategy dispersed. What we must rely on is not a grand strategy, but individual acts of heroism and excellence. I trust each and every one of you to give your all for the next sunrise.”

“”Yes, Sir!”” the people, be they loyalists or not, responded in unison.

“Use the empty lands to your advantage. Do not hold positions that are worthless to us. Everything here can be rebuilt. Treat the Guild Hall not as a series of objectives we must defend. Nothing in this space is gone forever. Use what you must, destroy what you must, give up what you must, just protect our people! Deploy!”

Everyone, except Emrik stormed away. Each of them had long been assigned a unit of soldiers, stationed all over the Guild Hall. Units that were currently getting orders from Chemilia. Orders that John could follow through the ear piece he wore, just like every other military member of Fusion.

“Siena, Undine, to your islands. Gnome, you are with Siena. Sylph, you are with Undine. Salamander, you are on mobile response duty.” The elemental women responded only with nods. Even Sylph darted off without another word. “Let’s retu-“

John abruptly stopped in his addressing of Emrik. A wave of intense rage made it out from him, catching the former Speaker of Commons off-guard. The middle-aged man clenched his jaw, bravely stood his ground and asked, “What happened?”

Pulling out the phone that he kept a technomantic connection to, the Gamer read the message with his eyes that his mind had just perceived. The storm of fury within him threatened to finally break out. He wanted to snap, to lash out at whatever was next to him. He swallowed the feeling before he would turn his wrath on the only and undeserving target by his side.

“An **** attempt was made on Lu Zhi by one of her close advisors. The Mandate of Heaven’s reinforcement will be delayed,” he responded darkly.

“…I see.” Two very carefully presented words. Emrik knew just as well that it was only John’s ability to stay rational that was standing between him and sudden ****.

‘How terrifying it must be to be weak,’ John thought and clung to the memories of those days. Then, he remembered how weak he actually was. Had he been able to save his parents? No, so what limitations was he truly free of? The questions served to put him into balance. “She has been poisoned but is in stable condition. It changes nothing about our immediate plans.”

John **** himself to focus on the now. A pocket of his mind was swirling around who, why and how. This was the first piece of news that had reached him from the Mandate of Heaven since Lu Zhi had pledged her aid. Even that pocket was muted when he returned to the helm of the command table.

The previous map of the USA had been replaced with a screen, laid flat on the table. John connected his mind to it in place of the phone, pulling up the map of the Guild Hall alongside all the troop data they had.

Fusion’s military operated in cells. The Abyss was not an environment for large professional forces. Illusion Barriers meant that small scale warfare was infinitely more effective in 99% of cases. Groups of 1 to 50 could move, take over a Protected Space, and hold it. Battle lines were a fuzzy thing and deep strikes were common. Supply was a much lesser issue, when power was internal. Battle lines were so much more volatile.

Beyond that, the underlying principle of Abyssal warfare was as simple as the mundane equivalent. The fighting continued until one side was either unable or unwilling to continue. Victory was won with the currencies of will and bodies. Everything beyond that was just an efficiency question.

John bowed over the table. He allowed himself something he basically never allowed himself: he tunnel-visioned. He reduced the presence of his mind in his extension to as little as possible, filling his field of view and his entire mind with the map before him.

Fusion’s dozens of army segments had been spread out across the Guild Hall. Refugees had been settled in the areas around the Palace, leaving every other District, except for the Military, essentially empty. Segments had been organized into groups. One group each was assigned to Park, Residential, Commerical and Industry District, two to the Production District due to its sheer size.

The army groups were the bulk of John’s available forces. Trained soldiers and conscripts of acceptable quality swelled the number of people he could command there all the way to 6000. A respectable number of people in the Abyss, and yet they were only there to delay things. At an average of level 30, they could do nothing if any of the Synapses came through and would actively give the Lorylim more biomass if they were overrun.

The path to victory was found in the rapid response teams. They were made of up higher-levelled individuals. To put an average level on them was a fool’s errand. They were deliberately segmented into individual groups that were each in a level bracket. Granularity would allow him to respond to the threats presented with the **** required to win the individual engagements.

Then there were the elites, the people that acted individually because they were just that powerful. Much of them and the rapid response troops were moving westwards now, to counteract the forces that the Lorylim had sent. Forces that were only the literal and proverbial first wave.

John updated the electronic map in real time with the sensory data he received from the Possessed drones he had all over the Guild Hall. He gathered data from the stream of battle communications. He gathered data from the eyes and ears of the his familiars. He gathered all the data and represented them on the map, for his fellow strategists to track.

He had told the people no grand strategy was going to win the day.

He was going to do everything in his power to prove himself a liar.

“Raise the Guild Hall by 5 metres,” he ordered.