Valor and Violence

(A few minutes earlier)

Jasmine stifled a yawn as she rubbed her burning eyes. She and Ferez had been working on the artefact for a few hours now, but though it was only mid-morning, she already felt the fatigue gnawing at the back of her mind. Shifting this much magical energy was taxing at the best of times, but the lack of sleep was taking a toll as well.

She glanced over at Ban and Asim leaning against the glass near the entrance, the former looking bored and the latter looking as expressive as a blank sheaf of parchment. Gaelon sat opposite them, glaring back at her, and Jasmine barely suppressed the urge to poke her tongue at him. As Ferez always said; ‘such childish taunts are unbecoming of a mage’. But by the same token, a lot of his actions were unbecoming too.

Regardless, she settled for a return glare of her own until he looked away. It was important to maintain dominance with these testosterone addled fools, and not for the first time this morning, she wished he had left with the rest of the marines. Still, his motives seemed surprisingly selfless, especially given what she had heard about him from the rest of the Sixth. He sounded like a real piece of work.

With a soft groan, Jasmine got to her feet and started walking to the marines, but stopped as all three shot to their feet and drew weapons. She spun to find the source of their consternation. The Key was glowing, and rattling around on the floor like a cat toy being jerked for some pet’s amusement. Jasmine slowly backed towards the soldiers as Ferez stood and crossed the room to join them, trying a little too hard to seem unhurried.

“Huzzah, this is the moment we have been waiting for,” he said brightly as he reached them.

“Any ideas what’s about to happen, Fez?” Ban asked, his axes held out in front of him.

“No clue, unfortunately, but for what it’s worth, if it was going to explode, I think it would have by now.”

“That’s… reassuring… I guess?” Ban replied, jumping when the Key’s movements spiked in violence. “How sure are you, exactly?”

“About sixty percent. Might I suggest we move outside the tower?”

“But if it shatters the glass, we’ll be cut to shreds!” Gaelon protested. Despite the excitement of the moment, Jasmine couldn’t help but chuckle at his nasal twang, likely a result of his broken nose. Ban had gleefully told her about his fights with Calris over the course of the morning.

“If the force of the enchantment is strong enough to shatter the tower walls,” Ferez said, patiently, “then we are, pardon the language, thoroughly fucked anyway.”

“Fair point.”

As they piled towards the entrance, the Key suddenly quietened, and they froze where they were. Jasmine glanced at Ferez, unsure of what to do. If the danger had passed, then she was glad to be safe, but it would mean the experiment was a failure. She wasn’t sure which option she was hoping for. Just as she opened her mouth to ask what to do next, several unfortunate developments rendered her unspoken question moot.

Firstly, reality tore itself apart in a localised area above the Key with a sound akin to a choir being burned alive. The rent looked like a jagged wound in the air, a sinister crimson light pulsing from within. Its surface looked solid, like glass or the surface of a still lake, and through it she saw a black, jagged hellscape and roiling thunderclouds. It reminded her of the depictions of the cursed underworld from Emrinthian lore, where the immoral were said to go after death, their souls to be consumed by demons. Which was apt, she realised, as the second unfortunate development occurred.

A clawed hand broke through the surface of the rift, sending ripples through its length. The hand had five digits and the same general structure as a human hand, though the skin was a wet, glossy red and the fingers terminated in vicious, black claws. A heavily muscled arm followed, then the rest of the demon as it pulled itself through.

It was big. Easily seven feet tall despite a hunch so pronounced it was bent almost double. She realised it didn’t have glistening red skin, it just didn’t have skin at all. The things bare meat was exposed to the world, ropy muscle marbled with sickly yellow strands of fat, thick black hairs sprouting directly from the flesh of its back and lower body, though its anterior chain from the waist upwards was hairless. She could tell, because it wore no clothing save a leather loincloth made from the skin of an animal she didn’t recognise.

With the rest of it exposed, Jasmine revaluated her definition of ‘vaguely humanoid’. The arms were far too long, its bowed legs too short, and its face… by the gods, the face. Two beady eyes set deep in their sockets above a pair of weeping gashes in place of a nose. The worst feature, though, was its maw. Larger than the rest of the skull combined, it had two yellowed tusks protruding from the bottom jaw and rows of serrated, broken teeth that Jasmine could see quite clearly as the beast chewed some sort of meat, unheeding of the blood dribbling from its lips and down its chin.

Silence descended on the group. It felt as though the moment stretched to eternity as the shock slowly sank into the minds of Jasmine and the others. She was terrified, but took solace in the fact that the demon, or whatever it was, looked thoroughly confused itself, and didn’t appear to have noticed the gaggle of stunned humans before it. She looked closer and realised it was blinking rapidly, eyes unfocussed.

Its eyes aren’t adjusted to the dark!

She resumed her slow march backwards to the entrance. With luck, they could slip out before the demon noticed them.

And then Gaelon, the dickhead, spoke.

“What the fuck is that?” he shouted.

The outcry drew the beast’s attention. It regarded them warily and raised an arm, a solid bone cudgel in its hand as it growled. She glanced around to find the others preparing to fight, Asim and the marines adopting fighting stances while Ferez summoned flame to his hands. She followed suit as she turned back to the monster. It was staring directly at her.

And smiling.

“Do not even think about it-”

The beast leapt for her as a javelin sailed by her head, catching the monster square in the chest. It howled in surprise and pain as it skidded to Jasmine’s feet, thrashing and clawing at the shaft, as Jasmine, with a very undignified squeal, torched it with a stream of fire until it stopped moving. Even after it had stopped and she had cut off the flames, Jasmine kept her hands outstretched, chest heaving and eyes wide. If it hadn’t been for the javelin, she may not have defended herself in time.

“You’re welcome,” Gaelon muttered as he shouldered past her and prodded the smoking corpse with his second javelin. Jasmine could only manage a strangled choking noise in reply.

“Old Man,” she finally croaked. “What just happened?”

She turned to find him regarding the rift with a hard expression as Ban and Asim inspected the body with Gaelon.

“It seems the Key opens some sort of doorway,” Ferez said. “Though how it managed without the other piece of the artefact, I do not know. Or, for that matter, what school of magic this even belongs to,” he finished before devolving into inaudible murmuring. Jasmine could make out a few words, a fascinating here and a potentially Aetheris? there and she strode over and smacked her mentor on the back of the head. He shook his head and gave Jasmine an apologetic smile.

“Sorry, got a tad carried away there, but this really is fascinating! This is either a hitherto unknown branch of one of the schools, or an entirely new school altogether! The implications are astonishing.”

“Yes, yes, I know, but I strongly believe our priority right now should be figuring out how to shut the… Doorway,” Jasmine replied, casting a glance over her shoulder at the rift. She swore she could see movement on the other side.

“Oh, I wouldn’t be too concerned. The rate at which the Key is losing energy, I anticipate the Doorway will collapse within a minute or two.”

“Which is a minute or two too long for my comfort.”

Ferez laid a hand on her shoulder. “Now Jasmine, that is enough of that. That beast didn’t seem too dangerous, did it?”

“Actually, you old nut, it did! It took a javelin through the sternum and I still needed to torch it before it finally died!”

“Ah! But it did die!” Ferez replied, raising a finger to emphasise his point. “They can be killed.”

“And so can we,” Ban growled. Jasmine turned to find Asim and the marines backing away from the rift as three more beasts dragged themselves through. On the other side of the tear in reality were the hazy outlines of many more.

“Oh, dear.”

Ferez shouted at the others to run and blasted the beasts as they came through. The beasts howled and charged even as they perished, their bodies protecting the demons following behind. Jasmine threw a Flash Bomb to stun the reinforcements and grabbed Ferez by the sleeve, dragging him along as Asim fell into step behind them.

Ban and Gaelon were already outside, halfway through the Courtyard when she broke out into the sunlight. Her legs pumped, the howls and snarls from the Tower propelling her into the tunnels faster than she had ever moved in her life.

Her lungs started burning within seconds as she struggled to keep pace with the soldiers. Even Ferez was outpacing her, and he was ancient! Despite the gravity of the situation and the threat of impending death, dismemberment and devouring, hopefully in that order, she couldn’t help but feel embarrassed at her lack of physical ability.

She vented by turning on her heel as she ran, throwing another Flash Bomb into the pursuing beasts, knocking the leaders down, though the ones behind didn’t falter as they trampled them in pursuit of their prey. With her back turned, she didn’t realise the others had stopped until she blundered full speed into Ban. He barely budged as she bounced off with a surprised cry.

“What are you doing?” she shouted as she clambered back to her feet and pushed past him, coming face to face with Calris.

He was dressed as she had last seen him, marine trousers and boots, chest bared, javelins and sword in hand. Unlike the last time she had seen him, the festering hole where his chest had been was completely healed over, with a layer of shiny pink scar tissue in its place. He cocked an eyebrow at Jasmine before the first demon rounded the corner behind her and answered his unspoken question. To his credit, he seemed unfazed, cocking a javelin as more beasts piled around the corner behind the first.

“Keep going and warn the captain. Ban, Gaelon, and I will bring up the rear.”

“But-”

“No buts. Asim is your guard. I won’t steal him from you, and you and Ferez will just get in the way. You, particularly,” he finished with a sly smile.

Jasmine scowled and shouldered past him.

“They are physically resilient,” she warned. “The first one we killed took a javelin to the chest and mage fire before it expired.”

“Noted. Now get going!”

Evidently, his recent brush with death had done nothing to temper his attitude. Still…

“Don’t die,” she whispered under her breath. Then she ran.