BECMI Chapter 133 – A Map to Massacre By

“The demands made upon those who will fight this battle will be horrific. The rewards for doing so will largely be incidental, treasures given the hordes by their Immortal Patrons or wrested from the hands of monsters here and there by them. Certainly, the money will scarcely be worth the time of heroes as elite as yourselves, so banish the thought of doing this if you think to get rich.

“Food and supplies will not be a problem. The first the Inn here itself can provide to all of us with little trouble, so fret not, you will eat well.

“You are going to fight and kill. I do not exaggerate that each of you will have to kill thousands of beast-folk each to see this through to the end. You will come out of this among the most formidable combatants of spell and sword to have ever walked this world.

“You will become masters of your weapons, because you have to kill the enemy fast, brutally, and with minimum effort, given the numbers that lie before us. We are going to be doing battle with hordes many times our number, and we are going to kill them all.”

My voice was flat, uncompromising, and committed. “I will see this battle through all the way to the end. If you come with me, I take it upon myself to see that you all will last until the end, as well.

“There will be battle, and there will be death, but I will return you to life if you fall, and furthermore, I will make sure that it will be damn hard for you to die easily… if only because I hate being overworked by the incompetent and overconfident fools.”

My eyes were narrowed as I looked them over, meeting each of their eyes, and Judging them.

Most were Good. Some were Neutrals. None were Evil. Few were Chaotics, the Mealyn predominantly, but they had their own motivations for doing this.

“There will be rewards here, administered by me for serving, coming from Cast on your behalf and to your benefit. There will be knowledge shared that you do not have, spells for Casters, training in weapons.

“You will not come out of this experience with great wealth, but you will come out of it stronger than you have ever imagined that you would.”

Knowledge from the future, the stuff that had turned my Free Company into the toughest bunch of bastards of their type any of them known, the fact I understood the technology of the aliens.

The Elven Wizardry Tradition and Hyn Scout Tradition only some of that knowledge. One A Day wasn’t known among them, of course, nor Naming Weapons to help them grow.

It would be.

“Our missions will be simple. We will go into the caves and tunnels occupied by the beast-folk, and we will wipe them clean of life. I intend to start in the caves and tunnels to the west of us first, around the elven forests there. This will free up the Ceruil to watch out for the raiders from the sea, and thence we will swing south, then west, then up.”

The map I had made of the place slowly had the bright red lights wink out and turn to blue.

“One of my jobs will be to seal the ways in and out of each cavern so that underground immigration by the savage tribes is no longer possible, and they cannot reoccupy a cavern behind us. This barriers may well be breached by outside forces, including the direct hands of Immortals… but if they are, I will know.

“We will be cutting off their migration routes, sealing their caverns, and if they flee us, ensuring that nothing comes in behind us to replace them.

Cavern after cavern on the fringes was wiped and turned blue, cycling and circling inwards, shutting down the expansion of the beast-folk, corralling them, and chasing them back through the underdark.

“There are no caverns they hold that I cannot reach, nor that I cannot exit from. If they come in their hordes, we will kill them in their hordes. If they scatter, we will run them down or out of their homes, force them back into their own, and spread the fear of our coming as they fight among themselves.

“We fight savagery and darkness with relentless and implacability. This is a process that will take all of us years to address. We will be crawling through the bowels of the world, seeing things seen by none from the surface world, and largely putting it to the sword. Our explorations will be soaked in blood and gore, and we will cross a thousand leagues without seeing the sun.

“This is the task and opportunity that I have set upon myself. My Free Company and the Lady Belle have agreed to help me with it. They come from the future, they know what will happen if we do not do this now, when this is the only chance there is to contain the threat of what the beast-folk will become.

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“Now I ask you all: Who of you wishes to come with me, stalk the darkness below, and remove from existence a threat to all who live on this world, and in doing so, prepare yourself for the calamities to come?”

My expression was clear and cold. I did not need them to do this. I knew what it meant to be implacable. I knew what it meant to kill millions, to deal with invaders living and undead, to set a cause and do what had to be done to fulfill it, ignoring the complaints and protests and fatigue of doing the task.

I could do this, I would do this, and I did not need them for me to do this.

This was an opportunity for them, even if they did not realize it. I was not asking for their support, I was giving them a chance to get stronger they simply would not have if they did things on their own.

The chance to gain strength and glories in war was waning. This, this was the big conflict of the future. The Iron Graf had grown VERY circumspect in his efforts after I wiped the Khirifi, and when some Darkmoor elite troops started toting around laser weapons. The Ertobolle Clans were definitely leery of pissing me off, and wisely so. Actions against them were going to be the focus of King Antius going forward.

“One last comment,” I went on, before anyone spoke into the silence. “I am a mage, not a foot soldier. I do not need to stay underground if something should happen on the surface. I can and will withdraw to the surface to rest, or if there are calls and needs for aid up top. I am not and will not be trapped underground, out of contact with the surface.

“If we need to retreat and reform and heal up, than that is what we will do. You can and will return to your families and your people, apprise them of our progress, and then return to the fight.

“The amount of fighting we will undertake will be great and continuous, but the beastials cannot force us to take a fight, we will never be trapped, and we will never be long and far away if help is required. I can and will vacate this entire gathering in under one minute if it is required, and could do so to the other side of the world if need be.

“This will be some of the most intense, repeated fighting you will ever undertake, and I will be there to ensure that you live through it all and come out the far side ready to face the true catastrophes of the age.

“Now, raise your hands. Who is coming with us?”

This time, it was a clear question and a challenge.

This time, the hands rose in response.

Princess Brittabelle thought she had been exposed to war.

She had lost her husband many years ago to orcs raiding from the Bleaklands, his body never found. Her eldest son was still obsessed with bringing his father home, and ran raids into the Bleaklands all the time with Zanzyran troops, hungry for vengeance for his father.

Brittabelle Erewahr had thus inherited the leadership of her clan and the title of Prince of Zanzyr, a job she had never wanted, still loathed, and which no one was more suited for among her kinfolk… although her older sister certainly made a hash of things with her crass Elven Liberation Front nonsense fighting the equally pretentious Free Armed Elven Resistance Youth movement backed by House Colorajo.

ELF versus FAERY. Even now it made her shake her head, as she spit a green-skinned beastman with vestigial black scales and a pincered right arm in the center of his chest, turning smoothly aside from the jagged club he used at her. As he fell, she used his weight to pull free her blade, setting up her next blow.

The Fire Reserve flew from her left hand, focused through the Buckler there and detonating among a cluster of charging beast-folk in white and green skin hues and different sizes and builds. Three of them were blasted to char, the largest lumbered up to her with a massive stone-headed spear lunging out in its blue-furred fist, which she turned deftly aside and then flicked across its throat smoothly as she ducked under and past its other arm, ignoring the body odor that broke across her nose and eyes like a wall as it gurgled and faltered.

She spun out of the way of thrown rocks, driving into its back, finding the heart promptly, and then pulled it out and darted with magically-enhanced speed for the rock throwers taking cover behind a slew of boulders over there.

She could have pulled out her Bow from her Archer’s Quiver and returned fire, or even Cast another spell, but that was not her truest aim, coming back here in time.

She was a gentle soul by nature, who tried to avoid combat and seek peaceful, beneficial solutions for all. At the same time, she had strong moral values and avoided many of the shenanigans and tricks that were regularly used by her fellow Wizards of Zanzyr.

She knew she had to be stronger, had to be able to endure war and blood, but she did not have the time as the ruler of Erendyl to overcome her own revulsion for the task, and the amount of conflict that would be required.

That was why she had listened to Edge and come to the past, where she had all the time and combat she needed to overcome her own unwillingness to face the enemies of her people in the ancient ways, steel to steel, blood to blood, and overcome them without remaining cold and lofty in the distance.

Which didn’t mean she didn’t have the spells, she just was meant in this day and age to focus on the Warrior’s Path, not the Wizard’s, to understand what the soldiers of her people and the humans she also ruled accomplished.

The only spells she used were Buffs that lasted for hours, and the Reserve that could be used in combat as needed. It was a very neat trick that Edge had taught her, something that turned a spell in memory to a literal furnace of heat that she could unleash endlessly, and it was based off a held in Valence just to power this.

She was not here to unleash great spells upon her enemies. She was here to meet them blade to blade and kill them!