Behind me, the harpy horde filled the sky. The earth trembled beneath the feet of the Church army as I ordered the wyrm into position for its devastating attack. The Church troops didn’t know whether to fear the shaking ground or the blackened sky more.
“Church of Light Army, and the free men of Prand you have enslaved in your service, I address you, all of you!” I roared. “Your master, Elandriel, the lord of lies and prince of cowardice, sent you here to destroy my city and lay waste to my lands. He wanted me to come here to fight … so here I am! I, Vance Chauzec, Lord of Brakith and God of Death, stand before you, and by the time the sun rises, you will all serve me whether living or dead!”
The Supreme Commander of the Church army, a tall and powerful Resplendent Crusader in shimmering gold armor who wielded a sword glowing with pure white light, stepped out to address me.
“You are lord of nothing, Vance Chauzec,” he spat, pointing his enchanted blade at me. “Your dark sorcery is a cheap parlor trick compared to the righteous power of the Lord of Light! Tonight, our forces of Light and Purity will vanquish your vile horde of demons and unclean things. Led by me, this army shall wipe the evil stain of this blighted city from Prand!”
“For every harm you’ve done to the innocent people of Brakith, scumbag, I’m gonna take off an inch of your skin,” I snarled back at him. “I know which god you really serve, and it sure as fuck isn’t that pathetic sap, the Lord of Light. By the time dawn comes, you lying snake, every inch of skin will be flayed off your body for what you’ve done to my people! But I didn’t come here to address the likes of you, you worthless maggot … I came here to address the free men of Prand you have forced to fight in a war they had no interest in fighting! Yes, conscripted soldiers! I’m talking to you!”
I quickly slipped a portion of my spirit into the conscripted soldiers whose bodies I had possessed with my enchanted crossbow bolts. With a simple mental command, I had them belt out a few yells of support, which were soon echoed by tens of thousands of discontented conscripts.
“Turn your blades and spears on those who forced you to come here!” I roared. “Fight against those who dragged you at spearpoint away from your fields and families, and I promise you that you will leave here tomorrow morning as liberated men, free to return to your homes! Even though you wear the armor of my enemies and carry their weapons, I have no quarrel with you.”
After telling them this, I didn’t need to use my puppets to stoke up any more anger or discontent. The conscripts were already at boiling point, and this promise I’d just made was enough to push them into a full-on mutiny.
“Fuck the Church of Light!” one soldier yelled. “Let’s kill the bastards and go home!” His cry of rebellion was immediately echoed by thousands of other angry shouts from the conscripts.
“I’m warning you, you uneducated gutter scum!” the Supreme Commander yelled. “Anyone who attempts to mutiny against his commanders will be burned alive, their sins purified by the fires of righteousness!” He was trying to sound confident, but the notes of panic in his voice were painfully obvious.
“There’s a lot more of us than there are of you, you pompous fuckin’ windbag!” a conscript yelled at him.
“We’re not taking orders from you lot anymore!” another shouted. “We’ve had it with this pointless war!”
“Sergeants, seize the rebels!” the Supreme Commander yelled. “Seize them all and flog them and prepare their bodies to be purified by fire!”
“Free men of Prand, it’s time to make your choices!” I roared. “Fight me and die, or fight against your enslavers and live!”
The Supreme Commander decided his best chance at stopping this rebellion was to try to take me out, and he spun around, aimed his sword at me, and blasted out a torrent of holy fire. I’d been expecting this, though, and in a flash, I pulled both the power of all the vengeful dead in Brakith and the many souls trapped in the Gray Sentinel into me, filling my armor with immense strength. The Supreme Commander’s blazing holy fire was intensely potent, far more so than anything Elyse was able to command, and its heat and fury were enough to turn even the thickest steel to molten sludge in mere seconds. Against the power of Death I now commanded, it washed off my armor like rainwater.
While he was futilely blasting me with this gushing river of heat and light, I calmly raised my kusarigama and threw a small tornado at him. The tornado wrapped its whirling winds around him, trapping him in a prison of madly spinning air. The tempest winds ripped his sword out of his hands and flung it aside, putting an end to his attack on me. Now, with him struggling helplessly, imprisoned in this cage of air, I lifted him up above the battlefield for all to see.
He was my prisoner, and he would watch from this air cage as I wiped out his army.
“The time for words is over!” I roared. “Anyone who now stands against me will die. Death to all of you!”
I commanded my harpy horde to attack, and the air became a hurricane of beating wings as the undead creatures shrieked out their ear-shattering screeches and dived toward the army. Behind me, Rami-Xayon called up a raging dust storm, battering the entire Church of Light army with howling, dust-choked winds. Then, in the midst of this unfolding madness, my most brutal weapon entered the fray.
Exploding out of the ground beneath the
