== VORTEX QUEST 5-9 ==
== CHAPTAIN CHAY ==
Word traveled slowly across realms but the pantheon had been in this place for a while. Their goal was to destroy the final vortex and Champion Slyell'Pvan knew they were coming.
The vortex fortress was protected by several layers of fully enclosing force fields. Every weakness, every exposed generator, every hidden passage had been fortified. Slyell'Pvan was one of the mightiest players in the abyss and he was blowing his budget on becoming the only one with vortex access.
With no way past the force fields, the demigods had one path forward -- deny his soul stones the juice.
The Aelves were busy taking over their new headquarter, one floor and hall at a time, disarming traps, circumventing curses, and defending against opponents who had started laying claims.
Still, they sent Fenmaedr along with the demigods. With subtle magenta insets on his laced harness freshly polished, the Spring Aelf had joined their quest for a realm liner of their own.
They'd been lying in wait for a few minutes now, observing the guard patterns from the top of a truck-sized skull overlooking the village of the Goring Scratcher Clan.
It was a forking collection of huts and tents of bone and leather. One tine-end was the docks where two barges were getting unloaded, the other lead to an overhang road where crawlway tunnels merged into the surface -- and above which their group was hiding. The fork's stem contained all the most important buildings, secure against the cliff. Guard posts were drilled into the surface all around.
"Any questions about the plan?" Chay asked. "No? Then let's fuck them up."
Billowing darkness rolled off his skin by the boat-load. He flooded cracks in the rock, his longer and longer tendril hidden from sight by the jagged overhangs and iron-grass bushels dotting the cliff.
"In position," Xane said.
"Give me three..." Chay counted, "two... one... go."
A tiny, nearly unspottable butterfly atop the totem to King Pwen'Gllach rammed into the totem as a lightning strike. The stack of grotesque art turned into burning chunks, bone shards and shattered chains raining on the Kobolds and the visiting Ogres among them.
Fan swipes. Chay let his smoke pour down from above the very back of the tribal village, making it look like something huge and amorphous was congealing right above the Urrk's hut.
Xane added flashes of green flame into the smoke pillars -- the sign of demonic forces teleporting in.
Shouts of alarm turned into drum beats and horn blows. Ogres picked up their merchandize and ran, bumping into Kobolds who had rushed from their tents, creating a street blockade that the armed Kobold guards had to brawl through.
Some sentries remained unsure, especially those further out, toward the docks. But they were unsettled, jumpy, primed.
"Little more," Chay requested. "Make it shocking."
A yellow-purple butterfly detached from Xane's contingent and zoomed down. It entered a storage hut and made it rip apart in a storm. A shockwave and thunderclap echoed across the entire canyon, loud enough to tear Chay's eardrums. Inconvenient but effective.
Kobolds everywhere went to the ground. The small army that had assembled to fight the smoke pillars was rolling in the dust, hands on their ears. Guards left their post to help defend the Urrk, even the dock worker Kobolds grabbed weapons and ran inward.
Pebbles across the village and the cliff turned over as the lids of iris-less eye balls in dark colors. The king himself was looking on. The umbralist didn't like the exposure but it leant the pretend-attack even more credibility.
"Perfect," Chay said and got shushed. Too loud? He could barely hear himself. He gave a royal eye ahead of him a poke and it flipped over, turned back into a pebble.
He focused the umbra-magic pulsing through him, speeding up the ear drum healing. Meanwhile he signaled his team to get moving.
Xane created an illusion of a drifting bubble cloud with his free spell, just big enough to hide himself and Chay as long as they curled up.
Fenmaedr drew out his gestalt and enveloped Marcus in the shimmering, black ghost-streaks. As Fenmaedr seemed to dissolve, the Aelf-demigod duo dropped down behind some tents.
Goro stayed back on overwatch duty.
With Marcus and his even taller, gray friend sneaking deeper into the panic-filled village, Chay and Xane flew on wizardly butterfly wings, much to fast and directed for such a tiny, low-hanging cloud, but nobody was paying attention.
Chay pointed his perception at the ships. Should he prioritize the conditions of the sails hanging below or the 'hull' arching above the deck?
"That one," Chay directed and slipped his head back into the illusory cloud. "Tattered sails but it won't crumble under our feet."
"On it, boss," Xane said and flew them to the top of the line of the black arches. They dropped through the webbing and the wizard dispatched lingering crew with some ice shards booming from his flexed chest.
Even though Chay's flip-induced gayness had to be fading by now, he was struck with dizzying adoration for the sheer power and manliness on display. The idea of sucking Xane's dick entered Chay's mind with the intrusiveness of a nectar vision. Xane probably liked having his muscles worshipped, right?
Fuck, he had really wanted to be a top.
"Earth to Chay," Xane said, tossing the Kobold his mage-hand held by the throat overboard.
"Uh, right," Chay said. "Good job. Untie the ropes and I'll turn on the ignition."
Xane swaggered to the boarding ramp. Chay threw a glance at the ectoplasma-crying skull across the village - seeing no sign from Goro - and a longer gaze at the tribal settlement where a few fires had started. His own smoke pillars were hanging unimpressively in the air, obviously not turning into a monster any time soon. They were on a timer.
The demigod of shadows and cunning quickly checked the steering apparatus, then hopped down the ladder into the underslung generator cabin. A dark red gem hung in chains and cables, a dozen human souls within getting sapped to keep the ship afloat.
Red sparks traveled forward to masts, to dissipate through the sails. More energy went up into the rafters and sizzled along the arches of black wood and iron.
There were safety mechanisms, locks and barriers, opportunity for sabotage, but the crew hadn't had time to turn on any of them.
Watery eyeballs with way too many irises squeezed themselves out of cracks as if they'd hidden in there all along.
Chay casually flipped off the one sloshing from a crack in the switch console. "Hey there King Fuckface. Hope you enjoyed the show cause we're off."
The eyes followed him around but one by one they blinked shut and vanished.
Back up on deck, Chay started the journey. There wasn't a simple steering wheel, but a series of levers that sent soul energy along this or that conduit. Nearly every ship was custom.
Marcus walked onto the ramp, followed by twenty bald hunks, each with a little bit of glitter around the lips, drooling, rock hard and jerking off.
A cloud of dark slivers with tiny spectral streaks coalesced into a Spring Aelf.
"Successful hunt?" Chay asked.
"Indeed," Fenmaedr answered.
"Fuck yeah," Marcus said. "Had to set a few distraction fires."
"Guys," Xane said, "we've been noticed."
An enemy crossbow fired a glowing red phaser bolt that zoomed through the barge, scorching ropes in its path.
A company of eight Kobolds with spears, bone swords and a crossbow rushed at the ship.
"Goring Scraaaatch! Attaaack!"
Xane readied lightning, Marcus let his ring jump off his wrist.
