Apostles of Doom

They had, naturally, anticipated exactly this move and so the Death Cheaters had set themselves up on one of the Citadel’s tallest towers, along with a wide variety of shamanic components and tools. Shamanism was particularly good at manipulating the weather, given their rapport with the Katsina, the Spirits of the Air. For someone who could befriend the Katsina, controlling the weather was far simpler, and more effective, than the wizardry used by the Storm Lords.

Karth and Valg began beating their drums even as their feet moved in time with the rhythm in the complicated dance pattern necessary to interact with the Katsina.

Citadel Battlements, Teragdor, Rasmeth

Teragdor and Rasmeth were once more on the battlements, moving up and down the wall as they ensured that all the troops were protected by the most powerful blessings and protection rituals available to an apostle. It was not glamorous, but the strength of their rituals was ensuring very low casualties.

The Unlife had increased their efforts to take the walls since this afternoon. They were no longer holding anything back. Even now, Unliving pterosaurs were dive bombing over the moat to ravage the soldiers.

Rasmeth raised his right hand, his Symbol of Torean clenched within his fist. He shouted and Holy Fire sprang from his symbol and struck the pterosaur on its long neck. The Unliving beast screeched in pain and scrambled to try to avoid the fire.

Teragdor, with the time that Rasmeth had bought them, finished his gestures and made his pronouncement, a Ban of Holy Righteousness. The pterosaur suddenly collapsed, it’s Unlife banished from the corpse.

“Chop that thing into little pieces so it can’t be reanimated,” Teragdor told the soldiers nearby. He wasn’t actually sure whether or not a corpse could be reanimated after a Ban of Holy Righteousness — having never done one before — but he figured it was not worth taking the chance.

Rasmeth had already moved on to the second pterosaur, this time managing to hit it in the eye, searing through it and burning out the brain. “Incredible shot!” Teragdor shouted to the other apostle.

He glanced down off the wall to where one of the D’Orc regiments was clearing the field near the base of the wall. To say the view was incredibly surreal was an understatement. The D’Orcs were wielding insanely massive weapons that were out of proportion even to someone of their great size. He had no idea what sort of strength it would take to wield such weapons.

There was one D’Orc down on the ground simply spinning in circles, wielding some sort of cross between a sword and scythe. His circles were wide and he moved up and down among the Unlife, creating a massive swath of carnage. Bodies and limbs were rendered and then smashed on a second pass.

The problem with that, Teragdor thought, was that, in the case of zombies, their limbs were still active — at least until the head was destroyed. He blinked, realizing that behind the D’Orc with the giant blade, another, smaller D’Orc — a child D’Orc? — was coming along and stomping on and smashing any severed heads it found.

Teragdor shook his head and grinned. His grin faded, however, when he looked further down the wall, in the direction the D’Orcs had come from. Soldiers, most likely ghasts and ghouls, were shoveling the mangled zombie parts into the moat. If they managed to dump enough zombie mush into the Holy Water, it would become contaminated, allowing the aerial Unlife an easy route over the moat.

He gave Rasmeth a small thump on the shoulder and directed the other apostle’s gaze to the moat-stuffing ghouls. “We better head that way!”

Rasmeth nodded and said, “I’ll get word to Leighton. He can relay that to the Sky Wardens.”

Leighton was about a thousand feet north and two hundred feet above them, on one the Sky Warden’s MAHCs, Mobile Aerial Healing Carpets, which were extremely large flying carpets that served as flying triage and healing centers. The carpets were heavily loaded with protective spells to keep Unlife at bay and were manned by not only priests, but also by Brothers and Sisters of Krinna. Wounded Sky Wardens could either land or be brought to the carpet for healing.

MAHC Alpha-7, Leighton

Leighton thanked Rasmeth for the information and quickly threaded his way to Leftenant Tylyr Felbs. “Leftenant,” Leighton said to get the MAHC commander’s attention.

“Yes?” the leftenant asked.

“I just received word from the Apostle Rasmeth that ghoul soldiers are moving in behind the D’Orc carnage and shoveling zombie parts into the moat near wall checkpoint 34. They are moving down-wall to intercept, but wanted to alert Sky Command,” Leighton said.

Leftenant Felbs nodded. “Good — or rather, bad, but good to know. I will relay to Sky Command.” He shook his head. “I am unbelievably thankful for the return of the D’Orcs, but it would have been nice if we could have coordinated our work better, to avoid this sort of situation.”