Chapter 698 - Shattered Pieces of Peace

Over the next few weeks, Zeke tried his best to be there for his friends and family, and to some degree, he was successful.  He knew he didn’t fit.  He could feel that with every fiber of his being.  Everyone around him was made of cardboard, and he needed to take special care just to keep from tearing them to pieces.  Such was the cost of being so very powerful. 

However, with constant constraint, it was possible for him to enjoy their company.  He watched them with pride.  He laughed with them.  Cried with them.  He heard their stories, reveling in their accomplishments. 

But in the end, it couldn’t last. 

He’d known that from the very beginning, and yet, he desperately needed it to persist.  So, he clung to that peace – that small sliver of mundanity – hoping against hope that its shattering would wait just a little bit longer. 

He did not get his wish.

“They’re coming,” said Oberon, approaching him as he sat in a glade and watching the faeries flitting from one tree to the next.  The dwarf’s domain was a magical place that seemed both more solid than anything Zeke had ever experienced, but almost dreamlike in how it presented itself.  The colors were vivid and surreal, almost like he was looking at a watercolor painting. 

“Who?” Zeke asked. 

“Simeon.”

“Which one is that?” he asked, remembering that, after Mak’tar’s death, there were six remaining greater gods.  One of them was standing right beside him.  Two were mostly unfamiliar to him.  Terus and Simeon.  The rest were all-too-familiar.  Aja, Oda, and Shar Maelaine. 

Their time would come.

“God of the sea,” Oberon answered.  “He has opened a portal into my domain, boring through my defenses and arriving in the deepest part of the sea.  He will make landfall within the hour.”

Zeke pushed himself to his feet.  “You can’t stop him?  I thought this was your domain.  You’re supposed to be all-powerful here.”

Oberon shook his head. “Once, that might have been true,” he acknowledged.  “No longer, though.  The numbers of my faithful continue to dwindle by the day.  I am old and weak.  I thought I could maintain my defenses, but that clearly is not the case.  I…I am sorry, but I must ask for your help.  Will you defend my people?”

Zeke narrowed his eyes.  He liked Oberon, at least as far as he knew the god.  He didn’t trust him though.  Not entirely, at least.  Instead, he looked at his every action with a healthy degree of suspicion. 

And his instincts told him to look for a trap.

“You wouldn’t be trying to trick me, would you?” Zeke asked.

“To what end?  My fate is your fate.  I will submit to you when the time comes.  You can harvest my divine energy.  I will not fight.”

“Why?”

“I have already told you, Zeke.  I am not much longer for this reality.  I no longer possess the drive to continue.  Once, I might have wished to fight with you, but that…is not my path,” he answered.  “I can neither survive the road you must travel or the destination you seek.  I am not strong enough.  But if my power can give you what you need to prevail, then I will gladly sacrifice myself. I only ask that you preserve my people.”

It was the most straightforward answer Oberon had ever uttered, though it wasn’t that different than what he’d said before.  It did give Zeke the reassurance he needed, though. 

So, he said, “Very well.  Do you have a plan to repel this invasion?”

“I do.  You must battle Simeon.  I will be occupied shielding my people and holding my domain together.  They will assist you, though not with the main battle.  Instead, they will fight the lesser gods that make up Simeon’s army,” Oberon answered without a moment’s hesitation.  “You must drive him off quickly.  Otherwise, my domain will be destroyed, and we will all be cast out into the void.”

Zeke clenched his fist.  “That means I can’t just use [Primordial Wrath],” he reasoned.  The last time he had used that ability, he’d destroyed an entire planet.  “I guess we do it the old-fashioned way, then.”

With that, Zeke turned and strode toward the arch that represented the gate to the Crimson Tower.  Once inside, he summoned a kobold to him and told her to fetch Kianma, Silik, Pudge, Tucker, and Talia.  It only took a few moments for the group to muster, though Irish had accompanied the alchemist.

Zeke gave her a nod of respect before launching into an abbreviated explanation of what was going on.  Then, he said, “I need anyone who can stand up to a lesser god.  They must fight the broader battle while I focus on their lord.”

“We have nearly a hundred thousand kobolds, fifteen thousand beastkin, and few thousand various other races who have ascended to this realm.  They can fight,” Silik stated.

Kianma added, “I will liaise with the faerie leaders so we can coordinate our response.”

She didn’t hesitate to take off at a sprint that quickly saw her exiting the tower through the gate.  Meanwhile, Silik had already spoken to a runner, sending them to muster the forces in question.  He then said that they would be ready for war in fifteen minutes. 

“Where do you want the Jade Princess?” asked Iris, the elven captain who had married Tucker. 

“That’s a ship?”  Zeke asked.

“Airship,” she answered brusquely.  “Believe me, you want us in battle.  We will make the difference you need.”

“I’ll leave that to Silik.  He knows your capabilities far better than I do,” Zeke answered.  Then, to Talia and Pudge, he went on, “You two – follow Silik’s orders.  He knows how to deploy you.”

Pudge nodded.  Then, he asked, “What of Sasha?”

“Does she want to participate?” Zeke asked.  The boarkin girl from the Eternal Realm had eschewed violence.  Certainly, she had made herself extremely valuable during the war against the Radiant Host, but since then, she’d taken a backseat.  Clearly, she didn’t enjoy using her power like that.

“She will do what she must.  We have all hardened ourselves against the world.  We know what is at stake.”

“Then have her do whatever she can to protect this place.  Perhaps she can help Oberon keep the world together,” Zeke suggested. 

“I will inform her,” Pudge said.

Talia clearly wanted to talk, but Zeke knew good and well what she wanted to say.  She wanted to help him against Simeon.  But he knew better than to allow that.  As special as Talia was, she could not survive the wrath of a greater god.  She just wasn’t strong enough. 

So, Zeke just gave her a short shake of his head, then left the tower behind.  She could fight the lesser gods – she was strong enough for that – but he wouldn’t allow her to be killed by someone like Simeon.

With that in mind, he left the tower behind and dismissed the gate before asking Oberon which direction he was meant to go.  The dwarven nature god pointed him to the east, so Zeke wasted no more time before taking off.  As he did, he used [Primordial Titan], growing dozens of feet with each of his first two steps.  Once he fully took that form, and he towered over the trees, he truly put his speed to the test.

And he was not disappointed. 

With every step, he covered hundreds of feet.  So, when he sprinted, he could truly cover quite a lot of ground.  Because of that speed, he arrived at his destination – which was a continent away – in minutes.  With the sea looming before him, he summoned his gate, and an army spilled out.

As he let [Primordial Titan] fall away, rank after rank of powerful kobolds poured from the arch, followed by hundreds of beastkin and other races.  Finally, Iris strode through, and with a wave of her hand, a massive airship – maybe a hundred yards long – manifested in a swirl of mana.  She, Tucker, and her crew climbed aboard via a rope ladder, and in only moments, the airship was underway. 

That’s when Talia found him.

“I want to help you,” she said, her hands on her hips. “You know what I can do.”

“No.  I need you to protect the army.”

“I’m not a protector.  I’m an attacker.”

“Not today,” he replied.  “Look – I know you want to be there with me, but –”

“But you need me elsewhere.  Just like the last time you left.”

She sounded like a sullen teenager, which made some degree of sense.  Her maturity had suffered greatly when she’d been rendered into one of the undead.  Her emotions had been buried deep, and she’d never been forced to confront them.  Now, she was making up for that lack. 

Even after a hundred years, she hadn’t fully recovered.  Perhaps she never would.

“I’m not going anywhere, Talia.”

“I hope you’re telling the truth.”

Then, she headed off to join the gathering army, leaving Zeke a little dumbfounded.  He knew she’d latched onto him pretty hard, but he hadn’t expected her grip to be so firm.  He understood where she was coming from, but that didn’t mean he knew how to combat the situation.

“You’re an idiot,” Eveline said.

“What?”

“You.  Are. An. Idiot.”

“Yeah, no – I heard you.  I’m just not sure why you’d say that,” he responded.  “Scratch that.  I know exactly why you would say it, generally speaking. I just don’t know why you’d choose now to break your silence, and in that way.”

“Because you’re the only person who ever treated her with genuine kindness,” Eveline explained.  “It would have been weirder if she hadn’t developed feelings for you.”

“There’s nothing romantic here.”

“Of course there isn’t.  If I had to guess, I’d say the girl is entirely aromantic.  But that doesn’t mean she isn’t obsessed with you,” Eveline explained. 

“I don’t have time for this.”

“When will you have time?  You could have dealt with this at any point over the last few weeks, but you chose to ignore it.  Now, you’re on the verge of fighting another greater god, and something tells me this one won’t be the pushover the last one was,” Eveline pointed out.  “He’s going to come prepared for you.”

“I know, but that doesn’t change the fact that I can’t just make things right with Talia.  Not right now.  I’ll take care of it after the fight.”

“You know how that usually goes, right?  You keep putting things off until the chance to really do something will have passed you by.”

“I don’t –”

Before Zeke could utter another word, he caught sight of a tidal wave coming in their direction.  It was hundreds of feet tall, and if it had existed on Earth, it would have washed an entire country away before its path came to a halt. 

“Damn,” he muttered.  “That’s a big wave.”

“You’re not wrong.”

Indeed, it was even larger than the waves he’d encountered in Hell.  Still, he was much better prepared to endure them.  So, as it raced toward shore, Zeke embraced [Primordial Titan].  At the same time, Silik barked one order after another.  A squad of Spiritweavers used some sort of ability, erecting a massive shield in front of the army.  Layered atop that was the faeries’ defensive skills.  And finally, a group of beastkin sorcerers summoned another bubble of mana meant to cut the wave’s kinetic force. 

Then, they waited.

Twenty seconds passed, and it drew closer. 

Thirty.

Forty.

And finally, with a roar, it crashed into them, and the battle began as hundreds of gilled men and women leaped from the waters, throwing out a variety of attacks. 

Zeke waded forward, those mana-based skills bouncing off his rocky exterior.  Meanwhile, the wave flowed around the bubble, retreating after only a few more moments. 

“You don’t look like a godkiller,” came a booming voice.

Zeke focused on the speaker, a giant figure that epitomized the title of god of the sea. 

“Simeon.”

“And you are Ezekiel.  You killed Mak’tar.”

“I did,” Zeke answered.  It was like the entire battle was far away, though it had already begun to rage all around them as Simeon waded forward. 

“I don’t mourn him.  He was little more than a pest.  However, I can’t allow it to go unanswered.  I’m sure you understand,” the sea god said, wielding a harpoon in one hand and a hook in the other.  “Besides, I’ve had my eye on this domain for quite some time.”

“Then come and get it.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”