Battalion 1

Corrupted Coil: A Young Adult Dystopian Epic Fantasy Action Adventure is now available on Royal Road. New chapter will be posted Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday PST. You can also read the whole series on Theo Mann's Amazon Author Page, listed in the notes after each released chapter. Please check it out.

Description:

In a world of constantly shifting wild magic and Dark powers, where the nature of reality is never what it seems, four disconnected wanderers must join forces to stop a plot to destroy both themselves and their world from total annihilation.

With their town wiped out around their ears and magical assassins hunting for their lives, a babbling lunatic, a homeless Barbarian, an orphan girl, and a junior guardsman with no magical power might be the last people anyone expects to save the world from disaster, especially when these four don’t want to save the world from disaster at all.

With time running out and their own lives on the line, this unlikely band of friends must rewrite the rules governing the Corrupted Coil and alter the course of existence to bring a new king to the throne before their enemies catch up with them first.

Here' a sample from Chapter 1.

Thank you for reading!

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Chapter 1

“Darklings attacking!” Yann Dilnao yelled up the line of Watchmen posted on his right.

The men of the Black Watch stood twenty feet apart along the magical barricade protecting the town of Middleborough from the chaos of wild magic outside.

The barricade formed a huge transparent dome over the messy collection of low, roughly thatched houses cramped inside the town.

The magic surface protected Middleborough from hurricane winds of red, black, and burnt-orange currents moving out in the Coil.

That protection wouldn’t last, though. Magical vapors sent waves of sparks shimmering across the dome and around the town’s perimeter wall. Those sparks gave the only evidence that the dome was still there protecting the town from destruction.

Yann tightened his grip on his war glaive and braced himself for the incoming attack. Monstrous shapes erupted from Dark Layers beyond the barricade.

Gargantuan slithering creatures poured from shadows between the Dark Layers. The Darklings undulated in the shifting undertow of magic and potential to surround the town.

Then turned their hideous fanged mouths and tentacles on Middleborough.

Men’s voices yelled up and down the barricade on Yann’s right. “Stand fast!” his father bellowed. “Hold the line!”

“They’re coming in fast!” Rien Dugas called back.

He said a few other things Yann didn’t catch over the noise. The barricade muffled the wind rumbling and booming outside. The Darklings added their thunderous roars to the pounding din echoing across the shadowy landscape out there.

These Darklings were nothing like the creatures the Black Watch had faced in the past. These were ten times bigger, much faster, and a thousand times more hideous.

Spikes and razor edges lined their whipping tentacles. Their jaws cracked to reveal bristling fangs dripping with poison. Magic flashed and crackled on the Darklings’ skin to light up the shadows beyond the barricade.

The Dark Layers rippled through the night disgorging hundreds of Darklings. They ranged down the barricade to encircle the town. The Darklings would overrun the Black Watch, break through the barricade, and that would be the end of Middleborough.

The town had lost contact with any other isolated Islands of stability in this remote corner of the Coil.

Middleborough had been living on borrowed time for months. The Black Watch couldn’t hold the Coil’s shifting magical forces at bay for much longer.

Then the Coil would swallow Middleborough along with every other Island in this sea of chaos.

Was tonight the night? Was this battle the moment when the forces of mayhem and destruction annihilated Middleborough and everyone inside it? It was only a matter of time.

The Black Watch alone stood between the town and certain doom. Yann faced down the thickest knot of Darklings coming straight for him.

He planted his legs wide and brandished his glaive to take the full brunt of the assault. His father, Yvan Dilnao, Commander of the Middleborough Watch, had posted Yann at the farthest end of their line.

Yann was the youngest Watchmen in Middleborough. Yvan usually put Yann here to keep him out of the thickest fighting. Tonight, that strategy turned out to be a huge mistake.

The Darklings came thickest from Yann’s left. No other Watchmen guarded the wall down there. Yann faced the full Darkling assault by himself.

The nearest Watchman to him was twenty feet away with the others spaced farther down the wall to his right. They couldn’t leave their posts to help him—not without leaving the rest of the barricade unguarded.

Yann spent his life training to be a Watchman, but nothing prepared him for this. This was it. He wouldn’t be able to stop the Darklings from overrunning Middleborough. At least he would die in battle. He wouldn’t have to live with his failure.

He took a step back from the barricade as the Darklings advanced. They loomed out of the shadows and towered over Middleborough.

The barricade and everything underneath it looked so small and frail compared to these creatures. His glaive wouldn’t make a dent in even one of those things, much less dozens of them.

Screams and running feet echoed out of the town behind him. The townsfolk ran for cover, but nowhere in town would be safe once the Darklings got inside. They would leave no one alive.

Sparks and explosions erupted from the Darklings’ skin, but for some reason, they didn’t come any closer.

They could flatten the barricade in seconds, but they stood off. More flashes gave Yann a clear view of their vast, grotesque bodies…..and then he saw it.

The forks of light and flame cascading down the Darklings’ bodies gave him a glimpse of silhouetted figures moving around out in the Coil. They were tiny compared to the Darklings, but he saw at one glance that they were all human.

“Hey!” he yelled up the line. “There are people out there! Someone’s out there fighting the Darklings!”

“Stand fast, boy!” Rien hollered back.

Yann stared at the strangers dashing back and forth in the gloom. Their clothes billowed and slashed in the storm…..and then more bursts of light showed him exactly what was going on out there.

Light flared down on the ground as a tall figure stabbed something into one of the Darklings. A magical discharge exploded across the Darkling’s skin and the creature thundered in rage and pain. The monster rounded on the tiny stranger who dared to attack it.

The Darkling reared and arched its yawning mouth downward. The creature prepared to snatch the stranger when another outline zoomed out of the Coil.

This one was smaller with long dark hair whipping from the head. The lithe body had the curves of a female, but she looked much younger than the first figure.

She darted between the wizard and the Darkling, planted herself there, and thrust out a short staff gripped in both hands. The shaft struck the Darkling broadside and a devastating blast of magical lightning ricocheted back at the monster.

The thing arched even higher, but it didn’t attack. It roared so loudly that the sound shook the barricade. Then the monster detonated with an almighty boom. It shattered into a million black shards that evaporated into the wind.

“Hey!!” Yann bellowed down the line again. “There are people out there fighting the Darklings! Father—come down here now!”

Yann didn’t dare to turn away. He stared unblinking at the strangers battling for their lives against a mounting horde of Darklings. More of the fiends disgorged from the Dark Layers all over the place, but the strangers held their ground.

Running feet approached Yann’s post from his right. His father, Rien, and Omer Veco rushed to Yann’s position. None of them said a word as the strangers backed closer to the barricade.

The girl stood shoulder to shoulder with the tall wizard. Four more wizards gathered from out of the dark. Each one fought the Darklings back as best they could, but none of them could defeat the monsters the way the girl could.

The battle ranged farther to the left. The Darklings shifted their attack to flank the strangers. The more firmly the strangers entrenched themselves to defend their line, the farther left the Darklings migrated.

“What the hell?” Rien growled under his breath.

“They’re adjusting their strategy,” Yann pointed out. “They’re anticipating us.”

“Us!” Rien snorted. “Those people aren’t us. They’re Coil rats. They don’t belong here.”

Yann almost made the mistake of pointing out that these strangers were the only thing stopping the Darklings from taking Middleborough, but he stopped himself from saying that.

Four Darklings slithered sideways and came at the strangers from an angle. The wizard on the far end swiveled to confront the monsters. This wizard looked like a woman, but Yann couldn’t be certain from this distance.

The lone defender raised two star-shaped weapons, one in each hand. Sparks and flashes burst from the points. They shot through the darkness and hit two Darklings, but she couldn’t fight them all.

One Darkling shrank back and the other three struck without mercy. They pounced on her, devoured her, and then charged behind the other strangers trying to save themselves from even more monsters.

The girl held her position for a second while the Darklings encircled the strangers and made a dash for the barricade. “Incoming!” Yann roared.

Watchmen charged him from all over. They left their posts to surround him, but the girl got there first.

She sprang between the Darklings and the barricade. She landed less than ten feet from Yann, but he still didn’t get a good look at her face. Her hair lashed wildly in the storm and her sudden movements kept casting her features in shadow.

She landed in a crouch facing outward against five Darklings. Every muscle tensed and she burst into a wild rotating maneuver spinning her staff in all directions.

Magical blasts fired from both ends. She jabbed it at the Darklings, spun it back and forth, and ejected dozens of torrents and explosions. Yann couldn’t keep up with them all.

Three more Darklings evaporated under her assault before the tall wizard and their other companions retreated to the girl’s side. Five strangers formed ranks in front of the barricade to defend the town from invasion.

None of the strangers could destroy the Darklings the way the girl could. She blasted away as many as she could, but the Darklings adjusted their tactics once again.

They split and closed around the strangers from both sides. The Darklings left the girl isolated in the center and moved in on the outer edges of the strangers’ line.

Two Darklings pounced on a shorter man on the left. They devoured him and charged the barricade while the rest of the strangers were busy fighting more monsters.

Yann had a split second to see the Darklings coming before they crashed full force into the barricade. Nothing could stand against them. The barricade shuddered under the impact and magical discharges boomed down the Darklings’ misshapen bodies.

The next instant, the barricade exploded in a deafening crash. Darklings flooded the town along with the pounding tempest of the Coil’s wild magic.

Yann forced himself to stand his ground as a huge monster rushed him. Its tentacles whistled and hissed around his head. Its gaping mouth rose many times higher than the wall.

A tentacle slashed at him and he struck out with his glaive. He lopped it off and parried five more coming from his right. They cracked back to strike him. How much longer could he hold out before this fiend devoured him, too?

He chopped off three more tentacles and the creature roared. It reared its boneless body and he saw it about to consume him the way the Darklings consumed the wizards outside.

Only ordinary human men joined the Black Watch. None of the Watchmen had magical power. No way could a junior Watchman defend himself against one of these things.

He couldn’t do anything to stop that mouth coming for him. Each fang embedded in the creature’s jaws dwarfed him by a mile.

He had one chance to get away from it. He counted down the seconds before the mouth swallowed him and then he sprang out of the way. He made it as far as the creature’s side and slashed his glaive across the edge of the creature’s mouth.

He caught his blade edge on the outer lip and ripped up the monster’s side. Black blood poured from the wound and saturated Yann’s clothes and hair. It got in his eyes and nose, but he was already too out of his mind with battle rage.

He stabbed his glaive into the creature’s side and a vicious crack of magic ricocheted up the shaft into his hands. It locked his fingers to the shaft so he couldn’t let go.

The creature recoiled from his assault and rolled away from him taking his weapon with it. He held on against his best efforts to let go and the creature’s movements carried him skyward along with it.

It whipped him upward until he flopped right on top of it. He looked down at Middleborough descending into chaos.

Watchmen, strangers, and townsfolk fought side by side to drive the Darklings out of town. Yann couldn’t tell from here if the townsfolk were winning or not.

He scrambled onto the monster’s back and pure blood rage wiped out every other thought. He flung his leg over the creature’s body. Magical explosions hammered him all over, but he didn’t care.

He ripped his glaive out of the monster’s skin and stabbed again and again. Every strike sent another discharge of lightning through the shaft into Yann’s arms, but they only enraged him and made him stab harder.

He roared in fury hacking the creature to pieces. Blood spurted from countless wounds, but at that moment, one of the creature’s many tentacles coiled around and smacked him across the back of the head.

He fell on top of his weapon and fought to stay conscious under a hail of blows coming from all directions. He lay bowed and beaten under the assault……and blinked down at the battle on the ground.

His father and the other Watchmen battled Darklings side by side with wizards, but Yann barely saw them. He stared as the girl zoomed out of nowhere and attacked the Darkling from the side.

She stabbed her staff into the other side of the creature’s mouth. It howled in agony and she unleashed a hellish barrage of blows, stabs, and explosions on the thing.

It contorted trying to escape. The creature rolled the other way and pitched Yann sideways. He grasped his glaive trying to keep himself from getting crushed.

The girl struck without mercy, jumped in front of the Darkling, seized her staff with both hands, and thrust it longways at the creature. She released a withering blast and the Darkling dissolved underneath Yann’s sprawled body.

He slammed down hard on the ground blinking stars out of his eyes.

End of Chapter 1.