The officers bunker erupted in activity as Deacon began his trek back to the triage area. He wanted to take one of the potions he got from the market at the Udder but knew he had to get the dagger out first. Absentmindedly, he reached for it only to feel it dig a quarter inch deeper. Once he felt that familiar oppositely charged magnets sensation in his hand, he realized what he was doing. This kind of injury would be a death sentence for him alone in the wild. His reliance on others is something he’d need to get used to. Deacon was mostly self-reliant in his previous life. All of this constant combat and death still hasn’t registered as real, but this pain was sobering. Several yards later he could see the troops massing near the column but there was no slow down of ghouls from the city. Finally, he came upon the healers as they were packing up to move locations.

“Elle, need a hand. I was making more friends when I had an accident.” Deacon yelled while looking around. She wasn’t immediately visible in his current location. He decided to check his health and it was down by 65%. Deacon didn’t understand that he was last at 55%. So, Deacon checked his slate for notifications.

Caution, you have been infected with unholy creeping moss. If not treated, you will turn into a moss ghoul. Moss infection level; 20%.

Your resistance to Unholy has increased to 5%.

You have been stabbed with a holy dagger of Amon; upon death his blessing will make the ground around your corpse extremely fertile. This grants a 50% crop yield every season.

“That’s one hell of a fuck you for his enemies.” Deacon said as one of the Mulvarian healers came over.

“Are you hurt? Oh dear, let me help you. I need you to hold still while I get this…ruby dagger out of you. That’s no moss ghoul wound. Who did this to you?” the healer asked.

“Its been taken care of, I really just need you to pull it out and bandage it. I have my own potions to take care of the wound.” Deacon said.

“Well, I could just heal you and then you wouldn’t need the bandage. Its quicker and we must be moving.” The healer said.

“Not going to work. Magic spells don’t work on me.” Deacon said with a sigh.

“Silly human. I’m a priestess of Astrael the god of Light and Life.” Said the priestess.

“I thought there were only followers of Amon down here.” Deacon said with surprise plastered across his face as he lifted his leg, “I think I’ve got some moss on me too.”

The priestess began removing the ruby dagger, but it appeared to be sprouting shards of ruby very slowly into Deacons flesh. They weren’t long but any longer and they would have hooked into his body. Her nose started to twitch as her brows furrowed. She looked him in the eye and Deacon nodded back. She pulled it free and clamped her paw down on the wound. Deacon started to see spots. The next thing he heard was some chanting and a soft glowing light.

“Thank you.” Deacon said.

“Please do not let the acts of one person color your view of our people. If you don’t mind, I’d like to take this dagger to the head priest. I believe there will be some harsh conversations in Elder Ruby’s future. My name is Genevieve.” She said.

Deacon nodded and saw that his health was ticking back up over 85%. Checking his slate, he could see that the infection was gone but he had a new section under his health titled Resistances. He’d have to ask Armand about that later. That’s when he remembered he left Armand and Typhus in the thick of it. He needed to bring them the news and see what he could do to help.

“Thank you, Genevieve. I owe you one.” Deacon said as he picked himself up, frowned at another ruined shirt, and headed off to find his party.

It helped that his party was almost two feet taller than the rest of the soldiers. Not Typhus, he was only another eight inches taller, but Deacon would tease him about that later. The group Deacon started with was making great headway. With Armand at the front burning the moss ghouls down with that sword and volleys of stones opening gaps, they’d make it to the base sometime in the next hour. The ghouls were mindless combatants unless they were near the sword, something inside them knew that fire needed to be avoid. You would often see them jump back after two or three of them were burnt to a crisp. The Mulvarian forces were more like a steam roller as they used earth and large stones to bury, incapacitate, or crush them.

“I’m back.” Deacon shouted while kicking a ghoul into the path of boulder.

“Where the hell did you go? You can’t just abandon us like that!” Typhus yelled jumping from the back of a downed ghoul.

“I had intel for the General. It was a one and million chance that I saw it when Michael knocked me down.” Deacon said

“Out with it!” Armand yelled as he was relieved on the line to take a breather.

“They were never going to Mulvaria. They are trying to bring down the column and use it like a highway to get to the ziggurat.” Deacon summarized.

“Now pushing us toward the base makes more sense. How do we stop them?” Armand asked as a huge section of the ceiling dropped closer to the city.

“Not sure what we can do about the ones that climbed up. I saw one but its silly to think one moss covered Mulvarian could make all this racket. But I do have another crazy idea to get us closer to the column.” Deacon said.

“No, no way. We are balls deep in moss ghouls and I’m not going to be apart of your lunacy.” Typhus said pointing a finger at Deacon's head.

“Ty, that is a large city with who knows how many moss covered corpses. They just keep coming and as big as this army is soldiers will start to drop from fatigue. We will need some plan other than smash them till we get there.” Armand said in clipped tones.

“Look we need to start a fire.” Deacon said.

“There is nothing but rocks and dirt down here. I don’t see any kindling. You are mad.” Typhus said.

“Then your eyes must be closed.” Deacon said.

“I see what you mean. A fire will keep them back based on what I’ve seen during the fighting. You intend to light them on fire?!” Armand said finally getting it.

“Dumb asses, then all we’ll have are flaming moss ghouls.” Typhus scolded.

“Flint and steel lit torches wouldn’t be enough to get the job done. How do you intend to start this fire?” Armand asked.

“Well, there is something I’ve been meaning to try. I don’t know if it will work based on my condition but my SAYance power lets me use an ability of one of my captured souls.” Deacon said.

“Wasn’t he a wizard. I thought you couldn’t cast magic.” Typhus said now listening with more interest.

“Well, the wording is an ability they knew at the cost of their soul. Maybe I can manifest him at the edge of my aura like I did the bandit and make him cast it. Like a Pokémon situation.” Deacon said.

“It couldn’t be that easy. I also don’t like the part where you said cost of their soul. Seems sinister to me” Armand said.

“What the hell is a Pokémon situation?” Typhus asked

“Never mind. We could try to think of something else.” Deacon said as they felt shuddering in the cavern.

Suddenly they saw General Ferent rushing into the front lines. He screamed and full stone plate armor poured out of his skin covering his body. A large granite mallet sprouted from his clasped hands, and he began to wade into the monsters with an impressive killing frenzy. This seemed to spur on the tired troops, and they started making forward progress again. Based on how fast they were moving and how far they needed to go this was still taking too long.

“Well, that’s all I got. Maybe its because I’m only let’s call it two months old, I don’t have any other solutions.” Deacon said.

“Fine what do you need from us?” Typhus said shocking both Armand and Deacon.

“Five feet of space should do it.” Deacon replied.

Deacon began pushing his aura out around him as Typhus and Armand created a circle within the soldiers. He chose the soul of the fire mage they found in the marauder encampment. A red tinged outline started to appear at the edge of his aura. Its head turned left and right confused about where it was. Deacon pointed out to the growing hoard of moss ghouls and gave a command.

“Burn them.” Said Deacon.

The soul screamed as it lifted it hands toward ghouls and started gesturing. Deacon noticed his connection to the soul starting to weaken as his heart rate began increasing. He received a notification from his slate.

Emergency Notice: A soul in your possession is attempting to break free from your control. Would like to rescind your last command. Yes/No

“Choose no.” came the soft voice of Zageracks.

Deacon chose no. As he did so dark red lines started to stab into the soul. It twitched and contorted in odd spasms. Then the temperature around Deacon started to increase at a rapid rate until a two-foot red orb was floating behind him in a circular orbit centered on the middle of his back. He couldn’t see this, but Armand was growing more and more concerned. Armand had seen that color of energy before when he was very young. It was the light of the infernal plane, the same light he saw when he lost his mother so many years ago. Once Deacon started sweating, he commanded the soul to burn the ghouls again. The soul winked out of existence and the orbiting sphere behind Deacon shot out into the throng of monsters exploding into a tornado not of air but pure hell fire. It spun in a quarter mile radius for a brief period before it spun down into the ground disappearing.

The fighting stopped nearby as hundreds of un-burnt moss ghouls scattered in all directions. All heads were turned toward Deacon and he could just about hear all their thoughts, “what the fuck was that?” Deacon checked his angry looking red notifications.

Emergency Notice: The soul you are commanding has attempted to cast magic. You cannot cast basic elemental magic, Perk-Trailblazer has converted this War Mage spell from Fire Tornado to Infernal Pillar. You may now tap the greater energy of the Infernal Plane when basic element fire would be the effect from using SAYance. Considering the cost is a soul you condemn to the Infernal Plane and it’s one time use, no further penalties applied.

Urgent Notice: You have tapped the energies of two out of ten known hells. This is a feat accomplished by less than 5% of the population of this world. New Class Specializations will be available to you at level twenty.

Deacon dropped his aura and looked around. The moss ghouls in the immediate area have turned tail and the fighting was isolated to multiple scattered pockets. There was a stench in air like rotten eggs and his skin itched all over.

“Uh, I think I’m going to go find the elf lady.” Said Michael.

Deacon had forgotten all about him. Armand was starring at Deacon mouth agape and Typhus looked like he forgot to breathe. Deacon put his hands up and turned to everyone in the cleared-out area he was in.

“Ok hang on I didn’t know it would be that big or crazy. It was a one-time use thing, and I can’t do it again.” Deacon pleaded.

“We need to have a talk. But that will have to wait until we secure the...” Armand began to say as the Great column came crashing down toward the center of Gossamer city.