The Hundred Reigns 278: King of Spiders (20)

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Frea collapsed into a vile pile of meat. 

Lauriane’s disease usually transformed its victims into shambling abominations, but Chrom Cruak’s variant started to transform the elf into something closer to an ooze. Her skin and flesh melted into a sickening yellow slime akin to living wax, her bones crumbling as scarlet eyes grew inside of both her mouth and nose. 

“Protective Stasis!” Myrddin cast on her before the transformation could finish, freezing Frea between two ticks of a clock, trapping her between her elven self and monsterhood. “You foul fiend!”

“You will look the same once I knock off your crown…” Chrom Cruak taunted him as he lunged at the mage, magic swirling in his free hand. “Exaburn.”

A blazing inferno whose heat matched Simon’s own Edict of the Wounded Earth surged from Chrom Cruak’s fingers and onto the docks. Mel hastily fled with speed befitting her Class while Myrddin cast a counterspell with a wave of his hand. “Magic Bounce!” 

A mirror-shield of sorcery surrounded the elven archmage, the flames reflecting off it and being thrown back at Chrom Cruak. Rather than look surprised, the mummy king charged through the flames with his blazing glaive first. 

“Antimagic Thrust.” 

His Technique caused the glaive to carve past the flames and harmlessly sunder them in two, with Chrom Cruak using them as a smokescreen to strike Myrddin from an unexpected angle. His weapon pierced the Mirror shield surrounding the archmage—rather than outright dispelling it like Magic Eraser—and impaled him through the chest. 

“Your golden peace has weakened you… Myrddin…” Chrom said as he cleaved his foe in two. “All theory… no practice.”

The elven mage gargled, and then decomposed. His body and clothes turned to salt that fell onto the ground, much to Chrom Cruak’s shock. A mighty lightning bolt bright enough to illuminate all of Rosanne then fell on him from the cloudless sky, smiting him. The resulting blast would have blinded Simon without his Immunities, and destroyed much of the pier. 

Simon thought the impact would slay Frea due to her closeness to the point of impact, yet the time-stasis spell freezing her in place also shielded her from damage somehow. 

The sight of her sickened Simon, since he was indirectly responsible for this Fleshplague spreading and allowed his allies to unknowingly weaponize it. The fact it hadn’t affected Mel, who had been within an inch of Frea, and worked through inhalation painted a rather ghastly picture. 

Chrom modified my sister’s pathogen to exclusively target elves. Lauriane had created a similar weapon in a past reign, so altering the existing Fleshplague must have come easy to someone with Chrom Cruak’s resources. And he made it airborne on top of it. 

And if it had reached the Sanctuary as Eole said, then… then it might already be too late. 

Chrom Cruak remained standing in spite of some of his mummy bandages catching fire at the tips, deflected a magic-disrupting bolt with his glaive Mel fired his way, and then swung his weapon in a crescent motion. The flames wreathing the blade turned to ice that spread in a cold wave across the docks, with Mel dodging it by leaping over the advancing frost. 

Myrddin—whether the real one or a salt simulacrum—teleported nearby and pointed a single finger at Chrom Cruak. Green particles gathered at the tip of his index finger in the form of a glowing sphere of raw mana that soon turned into a miniature sun. The projectile flew straight at Chrom Cruak in a flash of speed. 

The ancient mummy’s metal wings divided into multiple blades that then reformed into a spinning, circular shield flying with its own magic. Myrddin’s projectile struck it with the light and fury of a newborn sun, the explosion shaking all of Rosanne. All the windows across the docks shattered, the pier on which Chrom Cruak stood collapsed beneath his feet, and a cloud of dense steam arose from the supersaturated seawater. Simon and Elsa were almost thrown into the water along with the petrified Eole from the blast.

Supernova. Simon recognized the spell from his battle with the empowered Nodens, except that the Zodiac Fiend had taken much longer to cast it; at least this variant didn’t pack the same punch. A Tier IX spellcaster at the very least. 

Chrom’s blade-shield had somehow protected its master and survived the impact, though its surface had partly melted from the heat. The mummy lord leaped onto pieces of debris sticking out of the water, had his flying blades divide into multiple projectiles swirling in the air, and then launched them at both Myrddin and Mel. The former deflected the projectiles with magical barriers, and the latter simply dodged them at high speed. 

“What do we do?” Elsa asked Simon through telepathy as the two of them watched the battle unfold. Chrom and Myrddin appeared to be evenly matched so far in spite of Mel’s interference, likely because the latter struggled with all elves’ dependency on mana. “Wait for one to win and kill the victor?”

Simon was sorely tempted to follow her advice, but he would need Chrom Cruak alive for questioning and the mummy king was technically on his side. He glanced at the safehouse’s ruins to find Voltobauta emerging from the debris in his misty form, his hands still holding Alcyone’s severed head. 

The Necromancer and Elsa exchanged a venomous glare, and for a short moment, Simon was convinced they would come to blows. He took a step in front of his lover to make it clear which side he would pick if it came to that. Voltobauta hesitated a moment, his face a mask of stone.

“Not here,” he said, picking wisdom over revenge. He turned his gaze onto Myrddin. “First the outfighting, then the infighting.”

“Agreed,” Simon said as he targeted Myrddin with an Invert spell in order to cripple his defenses. His magic twisted flawless and impenetrable protections into weaknesses, only for a Contingency to kick in and instantly reapply them. 

Elsa launched herself at the elven archmage in a flash of maddening speed, yet ended up hitting an invisible wall of some kind. A barrier sent her flying back with telekinetic force, though she managed to land on her feet anyway.

He has too many defensive spells active. Switching tactics, Simon transformed into his Wicked Angel form and triggered his Dreadful Aura, blasting everyone in the vicinity with horrifying Terror. Mel froze in fear—though she didn’t fall dead on the spot—and ended up struck by Voltobauta’s Ectoplasmer spell, while Simon lunged at Myrddin with his morning star in an attempt to hit him with Magic Eraser. Let's see how you fare without your protections! 

His morning star fell upon Myrddin, and struck Voltobauta in the chest. 

His weapon hit the surprised vampire in the chest where the elf had been a second ago, and bashed him into what remained of the pavement. The blow stripped the pirate of all of his defenses and would have likely destroyed him had they been under the sun rather than the evening, his mouth puking blood. 

What the—Simon’s head snapped to the spot where Voltobauta used to stand, and where the archmage was now incantating. It can’t have been an illusion, or my Clear Eyes would have seen through it!

The archmage had used some kind of advanced teleport spell to switch position with Voltobauta at the last possible second. 

“Doublecast,” Myrddin said, pointing at Simon, “Spacetime Anchor, Saint Beam.”

Anchor status transferred by Lovestuck. 

Myrddin’s finger fired a mighty beam of pure, sacred light. While Wicked Angel didn’t let Simon maintain a dark eidolon connection for long, it did let him incant the summoning chant more quickly. He called upon Carbuncle—the situation demanding it—and materialized him in an instant, his ally coating him in its protective Mirror effect. The Saint Beam returned back to its sender.

Simon had never been in a situation where two spellcasters both had a Mirror effect on, and the result was about what he expected: the spell kept bouncing back and forth between him and Myrddin at lightspeed, quickly losing more of the mana sustaining its existence with each reflection. 

Simon quickly flew up to dodge the last attack a second before his half-materialized Devil-Mirror returned to the miasma that spawned it, and then switched to another dark eidolon. “Dreadful fangs glisten in the dark, as the ruins of the past sink in poison eternal!” he chanted, his words so fast they likely sounded like gibberish to outsiders. “Devour them all, Mother of Serpents Einganah!”

His dark eidolon manifested in a cloud of poisonous smoke and lunged at Myrddin in an instant. Myrddin easily blasted her back with a Nova spell, but one of her snake-hands managed to pierce through his defenses and graze his robes. Poison spread on the fabric and then the elf’s skin, much to his shock.

“You can bypass Ailment Immunity?” A glint of horror and then grim resolve crossed Myrddin’s gaze. After all, if Simon’s dark eidolon could bypass Poison protections, why not Disease as well? “Doublecast: Earthen Wall, Tsunami.”

What did he just say? Simon wondered as he lost his connection to Einganah due to his Wicked Angel form interfering with his miasma control, his dark eidolon dissipating. Myrddin waved his hands at Mel and Frea to teleport them both to safety before disappearing himself a second before Chrom Cruak would have gored him with his spear. 

Two things happened all at once as the elf’s spells completed: a great wall of stone arose around the docks to split them off from the city, and the port’s waters began to swiftly recede and drag unlucky ships away from the coast. Simon could only blink in horror as a titanic wave began to rise from the depths until it reached hundreds of feet in the sky.

Myrddin hoped to drown them alongside the entire port!

“Come here!” Simon called Chrom Cruak and Voltobauta while Elsa hastily pulled out a teleportation gem. The two undead flew at them and regrouped a second before the Rogue shattered the gem. 

They vanished right in time to see a tidal wave sweeping away everything between the sea and Myrdden’s Earthen Wall.

Space warped them back to one of Imperial Intelligence’s safehouses in Endymion, far away from any conflict. Everyone remained tense for a minute, half-expecting another attack that never came.

That was him. Myrddin’s disregard for collateral damage had confirmed Simon’s suspicions. Although his Earthen Wall had likely saved most of Rosanne, he had been very willing to destroy its port to win. That is the very same mage who had been willing to destroy Valne’s entire army to destroy Frightwall. 

The Oracle must have grown truly desperate to deploy him, and he could wager why.  

“Explain yourself,” Simon ordered Chrom Cruak, his morning star pointed at his head. 

“What is there to explain?” Chrom Cruak looked outright confused. “I told you the moment we met that I would have my revenge. I never deceived you on my objectives.”

“You followed my sister in her madness, and behind my back at that!” 

“I do not recall interfering in your own plots,” Chrom replied coldly. “I am your ally… not your servant.” 

Yet. “But what you’ve done threatens us all!” Simon pointed at the petrified Eole. “She told me her homeland suffers from a plague, and your pathogen would have to have been released into Brimir’s atmosphere to reach it!” 

“Yes… my pyramid sowed the seeds of a new strain into the clouds when the Oracle’s eyes were set on our glorious heist,” Chrom Cruak replied dismissively. “However… I have no desire to see mankind wiped out. The new strain only affects my former kind… sparing the rest for us to rule.” 

“For now,” Voltobauta said icily as he held his chest. His vampiric regeneration and new Necromancer Perks had allowed him to quickly recover from Simon’s earlier blow, to the point he even shrugged off the Anti-Heal effect. “Diseases are hardy creatures. There is no telling if your new strain won’t mutate further.” 

“I should force you to make a cure before this gets out of hand,” Simon threatened.

“You could try.” Chrom Cruak met his gaze without any fear. “But what would that change?”

Simon’s jaw clenched beneath his helmet. If he had indeed released the virus into the atmosphere yesterday, then the winds likely carried it halfway across the planet by now. The new epidemic would already be well underway by the time they could even release a potential cure. 

The bastard was right. The deed was already done. 

Worse, Simon could ill-afford to waste someone of his strength with the Zodiac Parade on the way. Alcyone’s death, Muse’s alliance with the White Unicorn, and the loss of a good chunk of the Attic would already complicate everything. He had too many enemies to add another to the list. 

“The Oracle would have struck us either way after our glorious heist… the elves will be too busy dealing with their own extinction to bother us now… allowing us to finish them off once the Zodiac Parade passes,” Chrom Cruak said upon bringing out a teleportation gem of his own. “This is for the best. Meditate on this… Overlord Magnos.”

Chrom Cruak disappeared on those grim words, leaving a distraught Simon alone with Elsa and Voltobauta. 

He’ll be first in line once the Zodiac Parade comes, Simon promised himself. One way or another, he won’t survive through it. 

“He’s not wrong,” his lover informed him through telepathy, clearing her throat as Simon squinted at her. “I don’t agree with killing all the elves, but they will be too busy with the Fleshplague to deal with us.”

“Yes, we’ve solved one problem by creating a bigger one.” Simon met Voltobauta’s gaze. The vampire’s scowl hadn’t left his face since they returned. “I am sorry for what happened to Alcyone, but I have to ask, did you grab the Adventurer Crestone before leaving the safehouse?”

The latter glared at his employer with unconcealed loathing. “It teleported away,” he said coldly. “You have the Crafter and Alchemist Crestones. Figure out a cure for this mess before we inherit a grave.” 

“Shouldn’t you be happy about that?” Elsa taunted him. “You’ll find yourself right at home.”

“Quiet, viper.” Voltobauta sneered at her in disgust. “When you breathe your last and your soul threatens to pass on, you will find me there, waiting.”

Elsa met his threat with amusement. “Is that supposed to scare me? You don’t even have the guts to act when I’m still alive.”

“My oath binds me until your boyfriend dies, and I can do far worse things to the dead than to the living.” Voltobauta’s voice had grown terribly cold, his hands gripping his friend’s freshly decapitated head. “You will find no rest. I can assure you of that.”

—------------------------

Simon remotely destroyed his Dungeon core in Muse after that debacle, and he had all pathways he exposed Eole to condemned. 

However, it became clear in the following days that the Oracle had launched an all-out campaign against the Cobweb. The Musan government and their Finkton detective agency first raided all of the Bert Trading Company’s assets across the country, which didn’t surprise Simon all that much. He had expected something like that and already moved key assets outside the country, with losing access to Jym Coil and his former base being the only real drawback. 

He had ensured his and Magda’s safety at least, and they were all he cared about when it came to Muse either way. 

Similar attacks followed across Valne and Lore. The Paladin’s party and other knights of the realm seized Gorre Castle and the rest of the duchy in search of Elsa Nightengale. Myrddin’s spell had destroyed most of Rosanne’s port with nothing to show for it besides a wiped-out Monoceros Guild, the loss of hundreds of lives, and much property damage. The act had actually caused much outcry among its citizens and Illusea had to promise extensive reparations to avoid the White Unicorn being kicked out of the city. 

People suddenly became far less tolerant of their allies' antics when their excessive responses yielded little results. 

Everytime, investigators would only find empty offices, expendable mooks, and shut doors. Simon used Valravn’s old tactics against the Oracle by swiftly shuffling resources out of dangerous areas and towards safer bases in Fablan or Endymion. 

So this is how it feels to be on the other side. Simon had spent so many reigns struggling—and failing—to stamp out the Cobweb that it felt odd to be the one benefitting from its resilience. Like striking at shadows on a wall. 

The Attic was truly a terrifying advantage for a criminal organization. Its existence made it painfully easy to shift assets around in a global game of whack-a-mole. He simply condemned any uncovered access, denied the enemy any engagement, and exploited any crack. 

However, the Oracle’s inability to destroy the Cobweb didn’t mean her assaults took no toll on the organization. Profits had sharply fallen, supply lines were disrupted, and many of the Weavers were forced to go underground. Their enemies couldn’t destroy them, but they could hinder them the same way Simon had disrupted Valravn’s operations in past reigns. 

Moreover, their troubles in White Unicorn-controlled territories paled compared to the Fleshplague. 

“Amnenadiel has fallen to the plague,” Shabram said sorrowfully during the Weavers’ latest meeting. “Her Grace has ordered a full retreat from Magvolia.” 

“The new strain is sweeping across Valne and Lore’s elven communities,” Renal said. Simon had him reinstated to fill in for the late Odette Kano, especially since they had to move many of their activities to Fablan. “It ignores the vaccine marker, but thankfully only affects elves. I’ve heard the weeping of dryads for their dead reach all the way to human cities.”

“At least White Unicorn strikes on our safehouses are getting less and less frequent,” Borsh noted with a grunt. “The Paladin’s cronies are too busy killing their own sick friends to bother with us.”

“It might have reached all the way to Illusea for all we know,” Shabram said. “We have no way to check, unfortunately.”

Simon and Voltobauta glared at an uncaring Chrom Cruak. He had confirmed that the mummy king had relocated his flying pyramid to the upper atmosphere, where it had promptly released gallons upon gallons of his new plague into Brimir’s jet streams. It was clear Chrom Cruak had been working on this plan the moment the Fleshplague first became public, and that his fortress possessed considerable manufacturing capabilities. 

Allowing the maniac to operate unsupervised had proved to be a severe miscalculation. Simon had made the same mistake with Louis: believing that he could hold a tiger by the tail without getting swiped at. 

“What about Vouivre and Dassein?” Simon inquired. “Have we re-established contact?”

“Somewhat,” Elsa replied. “The dragon says she will only deal with you in person. I think she’s finally figured out who you are, or an elven bird told her.”

“I am also under suspicion,” Hector admitted. “My body’s reputation as a war hero and major White Unicorn backer shields me from scrutiny for now, but I fear this respite won’t last long.” 

“We’ll move you, Lauriane, and your staff to one of our secret Deepground bunkers as quickly as possible,” Simon replied. Euphemia would have no way of finding those. “I will deal with Vouivre. The Zodiac Parade will be soon upon us, and we will need to prepare for the Archer’s awakening.”

“We could unleash it on Illusea,” Chrom Cruak suggested. “Let the Oracle’s thralls bleed…”

“No.” Besides the fact that Simon needed to defeat Algozoa at the height of his power to consume his crystal, the Oracle was likely to have already bunkered down to deal with the Fleshplague. She would be expecting such an attack. “Consider this a test of your worthiness to survive the threats that will follow in the Archer’s wake. Those will be altogether more dangerous.” 

If they couldn’t defeat Algozoa at its best, then there was no way they could overwhelm a comet-empowered Asterion. The Minotaur alone could threaten the reigns’ underlying mechanism and represented an existential threat to Simon’s perfect future. He wasn’t willing to risk fighting him without at least high odds of victory.

If they couldn’t defeat the Archer… if they couldn’t defeat him, then going into hiding until Abraxas left the Minotaur’s constellation and outlasting the calamity might be the best solution, consequences be damned. 

Simon dismissed the council after that, though he asked Voltobauta to stay a little longer at the end. “How are you holding up?”

Voltobauta sneered at him. “Afraid I will betray you?”

“No.” The pirate had thoroughly burned his bridges with the White Unicorn already, and he had nowhere else left to go. “Believe it or not, I have buried friends too.”

“I have outlived more companions than you’ve had years, Magnos. I always knew it would come to this. The lives of mortals are fleeting, and my friendship with Alcyone was only a momentary instant in my long existence.” Voltobauta’s voice grew quieter as he let out a grave sigh. “Still… I had hoped this moment wouldn’t come so quickly, and I feel a sick burn whenever I see your girlfriend strutting around.”

“You know I won’t let you harm her,” Simon warned him. 

“So? I said I would outlive you both.” Few matched the undead when it came to grudges and patience. “Besides, you have a gift for alienating girlfriends, am I right?” 

Simon’s jaw tightened until it hurt. “Shut the door on your way out.”

Voltobauta slammed it shut instead. 

Once Simon was alone, he teleported back to his newest Dungeon base in a Deepground bunker and his treasure vault. Eole’s petrified body awaited him there. He lifted the curse hanging over her and asked the question that had haunted him for the last few days. 

“Why?” 

“I told you,” Eole replied with a glare. “Your plague reached my people. I had to take action—”

“Why didn’t you come to me when you found out?” Simon showed her the feather of friendship she once entrusted him with. “Why couldn’t you trust me?”

Eole scowled at the feather. “Why did you use my face to pillage my people’s legacy?”

A tense silence fell upon the room, before a tired Simon inquired, “How?”

“The elves saw it when they used Psychometry to try and find out how Vouivre unlocked the Two-Tailed Fish’s crystal. I didn’t believe them at first, but… you manipulated me and so many others, delivered my people in chains to Vouivre—” 

“Which could have been avoided if you had just done as you were told.”

“I am not the person in your visions, Simon,” Eole replied, biting her lips. “I know you wish I was, but—”

“You’re wrong, Eole. You’re the same person you have always been.” Simon took a deep breath. “It is I who has changed.”

Time and time again he had tried to involve her in his plans or give her the freedom to act as she wished, because she had been his friend, companion, and lover back when he had been a more innocent soul. He kept hoping that she would come around to his point of view, when the truth was that he had become a wholly different person from the Simon Magnos with whom she had shared a friendship with. He couldn’t recapture those lost days, and he simply kept repeating the same mistake he made with Anna. 

As much as it annoyed him… he had to cut his losses. Enough was enough. 

“You are too much of a free spirit, Eole, with ideals that won’t break,” Simon admitted. “I used to admire that, and I still do, but you have an uncanny ability to interfere in my designs. This has grown tiresome.”

Eole paled, but held her head high. “Are you going to kill me?”

“No.” Simon pointed a finger at her. “But I will protect you from yourself.”

He turned her to gold again, and left her in the vault to rest until he could safely release her. The tiny flow of experience that followed the gesture passed over in an instant, and Simon paid it no mind. 

He had a pandemic to cure and a world to save. 

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