12 Miles Below-Chapter 65Book 8 - (Part A and Part B) - The final war

AN: This chapter is almost three entire chapters long, but there wasn't any good spot to split it, so instead I'll post today's chapter and monday's chapter early. Next chapter post after this comes thursday again!

Knight Geralt held onto the staff of the goddess, carefully cradling it. The airspeeder hummed under his boots, the pilot executing perfect maneuvers. There would be no mistakes allowed. It was more accurate to state the pilot had trained his entire life for this one day.

And so had he.

“Entering attack range in two minutes.” He heard the chime from the cockpit. "All scavengers, prepare for payload drop."

It was time. He stood from his seat, then walked to the cargo bay where the doors had already been opened, scavengers preparing to drop him mid-way.

The white wastes greeted him on the other side. Snow passing by him at full speed. He handed over the staff of the goddess to the nearest Scavenger, who held it reverently, while the others nearby prepared the cargo drop pod that would protect the delicate instrument.

The staff had been built following the instructions of the Icon. An archangel of Tsuya, speaking with the authority of Urs. The clan heard her voice through their armors, and followed her orders without hesitation.

Among those orders, was the creation of this staff. One of hundreds built around the world.

A simple pole, with a plate attached at the very front, the face upwards. He would use it like a spear.

Her voice came through on his comms, patched through by the airspeeders more accurate equipment. “This cannon will be recharged in thirty two seconds. Enemy is emerging at three point four four five degrees down angle. Marking firing solution on your HUD now. Prepare for disembarkment and setup.”

The last clasps were sealed over the staff, and the Savangers held it off the side of the cargo bay, holding it ready to drop.

"Execute launch now." The Icon spoke.

Geralt leaped off the airspeeder, relic armor already preparing for impact.

He tumbled in the air, landed onto the snow, and rolled into a sprint. Ahead the staff pod was dropped, clattering for a moment before it started sliding across the snow in the same direction and speed he was going.

He caught up to it, and the pod opened up, staff being pushed up where he could grab it on the move.

In moments he was racing at full speed to the marked firing location, the pod itself completely forgotten about, it's role served.

He skidded to a stop at the designated spot, planted the spear base into the ground, and held it like a pike, the plate at the very tip pointing at nothing ahead.

There were a rumored twenty variations of this spear, all linked to the goddesses’s power. The armors had been unlocked and forged the plates themselves, autonomously, following the exact diagrams.

Somewhere else in the world, another knight was using a spear with the same newly crafted plate welded at the tip of a spear like his.

Likely two minutes ago, that knight's spear had been used.

It would soon be his turn.

The feeling made him feel connected to the whole. A long line of knights, all sharing the same resources, working together across the world to protect humanity.

His blood raced. This was his purpose.

“Ten seconds.” The Icon spoke in his armor. “Warfrigate Nattridos is circling around for pickup after your attack. The gods guide your aim.”

His armor equally lit up with images and video feeds of what prior scouts had spotted emerging through the underground. And more importantly, the weak point predicted.

Ahead, the world began to break apart. A claw sliced through the ground, and began to crawl upwards.

The Clan knight waited as the monstrosity larger than an airspeeder broke free from the world.

Not just larger than an airspeeder. That was merely a single hand. One of ten for this ancient demon.

More arms crushed through the ice and metal, and then slammed into the ground, now pushing downwards, as the main body began to rise up.

“Five seconds.” The Icon spoke, watching through his camera feed. He felt her there with him, right by his shoulder, a finger pointing forward at where he needed to fire.

Targeting solutions gave him a general prediction, and he angled the spear at where he believed the head would appear soon.

He was rewarded with perfection. The head ripped free of the ground, pulling itself up.

Geralt saw it. Further past the monster. Flying directly down at the monster.

A missile. One launched by another clan frigate further away. Guided with expert precision by the pilot. It had been fired seven minutes ago, and was still on course.

The clan knight watched as it homed in on the head, final adjustments coming from the pilot in quick bursts of fire off the sides.

“Impact.”

The missile slammed into the monster’s head not even two seconds after it had emerged from the ground. Shields flickered hard and crumbled as inner technology within the missile expanded out and fried the monster’s shields away. He’d seen it done before. Glowing blue jelly of some kind would sap away everything.

But that hardly mattered to the clan knight. His work was here and now.

Most of these machines had segmented shields, independent from one another. And right now, the head no longer had a shield.

The world narrowed until only Geralt, his target and the space between existed.

He pressed the trigger.

The plate at the tip glowed occult blue, and a portal opened up right on the surface.

Behind it, the might of the gods was called upon one more time.

The beam lanced forward with terrible might. Even his armors shields were triggered, despite him being far behind the beam’s origin point.

Snow evaporated. The very ground ahead immediately melted down. The thin fog and snowdrift of the white wastes was speared directly through, spreading outwards as the beam ripped a hole up and directly into where the monster’s head had popped up.

It was vaporized. The entire monster shuddering to a frozen halt, before toppling downwards into the white wastes, motionless.

Somewhere else in the world, in about two minutes from now, another knight would be launching a beam like so themselves.

He turned, and began a full sprint forwards. Trying to increase his speed as quickly as he could.

Behind him his warfrigate was rapidly approaching, the bay doors opened up, scavengers all across the outside, holding hooks out to grab and haul him back inside, a power cell prepared to swap out, along with water and a quick moment of rest.

“Thirty two minutes until arrival at the next expected incursion point.” The Icon spoke. “Please take your time to prepare and rest for combat, knight Geralt.”

“As the Archangel commands.” He spoke. He needed no rest, but if the archangel of humanity asked it of him, he would.

The other scavengers gave him a quick salute, which he returned as he sat down on his seat, and closed his eyes to wait for the next moment he was needed. He held onto the staff to protect it, in case of a catastrophic event. It was more important than the entire airspeeder.

The rest of this work was now on the pilot and the crew here, which he had full faith would complete their mission.

They all would.

The gods had come. Their clan would answer.

Tiberius stepped slowly through the biome, instincts guiding him forward. It had been six hours since the call had come through. Six hours since he had heard the voice of mankind once more speaking out of the walls.

It had asked him to return to the surface. To fight. But Tiberius knew where he needed to be. Long dormant instincts honed after thousands of deaths whispered to him where to go.

Over the mountains he moved. Under the seas he swam. He’d found himself this cycle without armor or blade, frayed cloth was the only thing he had to his name. But his search for a mite forge to print out a new set had to be delayed.

There was something more calling him now. Calling him back.

And, without realizing how or when, he eventually stood before the massive citadel. Spotlights tracked his pathway. Soldiers in gold ahead patrolled out. One team of five came up to him, “Emperor be with you stranger, state your name and who you are to the war effort.”

A madman, walking out of the darkness. Hair and beard matted up, eyes alternating between sharp and unfocused.

He opened his mouth to speak but only dust came out. It had been so long that he’d traveled around here, he had forgotten how.

He focused once more. Trying to move his tongue in the old ways he remembered from a lifetime ago. “Ti…. ber… i…. us.” He tried. It hardly made sense even to him. But he knew the next word would: “Death… less.”

They looked at one another.

Had he spoken wrong? No, he recognized their words, the language must be the same. Some part of his mind relaxed. Things would work out. He had done what was needed. The real work was still ahead.

“Hold for a moment.” The man turned to his fellows, gave a few nods, then turned back to him. “No other Deathless among the Citadel knows of anyone named Tiberius. We're running the archives.”

Tiberius held his hands still, looking at the strange beings ahead of him. The first humans he’d seen in so much time.

One snapped a helmet up, then the squad gave a salute of some kind. “Confirmed identification. Come with us, Honorable Deathless. The war effort would welcome your presence among our ranks once more.”

Slowly, he followed behind the humans. His people. They were his people. Or had been once. Seven hundred years ago.

Relinquished ripped apart the fortifications with barely a second of pause. The Feathers guarding the location were crushed under her fury. She didn’t care if they were involved in the errors that happened here or if they were culprits.

She had no use for weaklings.

She had no use for failures.

And they had all failed her. ALL OF THEM.

She stared at the hallways that had been so effortlessly breached. At the half-dying rat that had dared come back from the dead long after, to try and spite her one last time at the hour of her triumph.

A01.

Of course his stench was all over this area. “Misbegotten PEST!” She screeched, ripping apart the very ground ahead of her.

The archive footage of the Feathers she’d sent to guard this area was clear. It was him. And worse - he looked whole again. Unblemished. Stalking through her lair, striking down her servants with only half-hearted might. Walking with some unknown program at his heels.

Who was that digital avatar? Who else was left in this world? Did it matter?

The gate before her crumpled inwards, imploding with a force beyond its ability to hold off. She stalked through the ruins, waving an angry hand to rip the leftovers out of her way.

Even the architecture itself had failed her. Unlocked as if the enemy already had their hands on all her keys.

She must have had a rat on the inside. Those firewalls and security measures were unbreakable. Noone in the world had the processing power to do so, and certainly not at the speed A01 had walked past.

Something she would need to search through in detail, find, and squash. She would never suffer another traitor to live within her empire.

Beyond the ruined gates she saw the true damage.

It was gone. Off into the digital ocean, appearing and reappearing, impossible to track. Tsuya’s domain. A chaotic untrackable chunk of digital sea. Exactly as she feared.

A01 was now commanding the entire human race from that piece of inanimate ground. Tapping into all Tsuya’s network in full. Organizing. Commanding.

She should have won the moment Tsuya had been handled. How were all of these insects coming out of the woodworks to bar her path forward?

In the real world, Urs was merrily alive again, once more being a thorn in her heel. Speaking out, riling up the humans before they could be slaughtered properly.

But at least she knew where he was hiding. Oh she knew all right.

The entire world knew.

The Citadel. Of course he would crawl away to the only refuge humanity had ever stood a chance within.

Those mites should have ripped that biome apart centuries ago. How convenient of them to constantly pass it over.

She had a choice on which target to hunt.

In the digital Ocean, A01’s signal needed to be silenced. She could tell all the instructions to organize and mobilize were coming from that source. Millions of them every second, perfectly coordinating all of humanity against her.

Every nook and cranny, all moving to the same marching orders. To the scale only a machine like A01 could coordinate.

Humanity was active and rising up. Acting independently, or acting according to a larger plan, Relinquished couldn’t pin it down.

She reviewed the footage again of the breach.

A glower on his face as A01 stalked forward through her halls. No cracks anywhere on his features, no sign of soul damage. It seemed like a wilder version of him. More raw, more unfiltered, more somber.

He must have uncovered some kind of processing increase for his broken down shell and consumed it. Temporarily restoring himself despite knowing it would eventually alter his soul and identity. The dead protofeather was burning himself alive then.

Despite that, the signal he was broadcasting was a larger threat than even Urs.

He had to be silenced.

And she was the only one that could deal with her wayward son. None of her empire even had a hope of capturing and holding down Tsuya’s domain in one place. Her Feathers were useless for that task.

But the human citadel? At least her instruments could handle that with minimal oversight.

She quickly raced through the full logs, putting the story together on how Urs had managed to make it there.

The answer was evident. That blasted human male had abused his narrative importance for long enough, she should have killed him at that chess game. To'Wrathh had been all that was really needed in beheading Tsuya without allowing her an escape.

This human was never supposed to be a true contender to deal with. It was getting out of hand.

Worse: Now that he had embedded himself so deeply into the new narrative, she could no longer simply get rid of him like an unknown pawn piece, to be shot off screen.

He had to be killed properly.

She looked through possible loopholes to eliminate him from the board with justifiable narrative reasons, and came upon one option.

Yes. That would do.

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With a flick of a hand, she dragged out a Feather before her. And squeezed.

She didn’t bother with theatrics. No playing around with her subject.

“You wish for my forgiveness?” She hissed to the terrified program, squeezing harder. “You will earn it. Take every army there is in range of this Citadel, every Feather under my banner, every program you can command - And Hunt. Him. Down. Destroy the Citadel. Burn the humans to the ground. Do not allow a single soul to survive.

Do so, and I will let you live.”

She dismissed him without so much as a side thought. She didn’t need to explain the details, that one was clever enough to figure it out. He was the only Feather to have survived multiple engagements against that human after all, that had to count for something.

She needed a commander anyhow, it didn’t matter who was at the helm of the army, all he had to do was swarm the entire zone with bodies upon bodies until the humans were purged.

She had an infinite amounts of ground forces to throw at the problem. The humans did not.

Urs was weak. Incapable of fighting back. Without him, the humans would eventually fall. She’d force him back into the digital sea, and rip the secrets out of his mind here where she couldn’t be stopped.

Her eyes turned upwards to the sea above her. “You think you’ve won? You think this will be what saves humanity?” She muttered darkly, already beginning to spool up the full might she had under her command.

The machine network itself may be down in the real world. But here? She would create a new one directly. She had a planet’s worth of processing power to command. She was the Death of all things.

She would track down the signal that led humanity, the last lights they had lit, and snuff it out. She would pin her old nemesis’s failing domain back into the seabed where it belonged, and then crack it open until she could scoop A01 and crush him for good.

She stalked out into the ocean, ripping apart anything that was too stupid to get in her way.

Humanity would die.

And no last-second heroes would save it.

Wrath was having a field day.

I know this because she had outright stars in her eyes after hearing the speech given out. Even hours later it still rang around the planet and in her head.

It did make sense, to be fair. She was a Feather.

This was probably the greatest series of events for any Feather to be a part of. The single most dramatic event in history. Fate of humanity at stake and all that.

On the other hand, we were going full-out on planning ahead here. The Citadel was mobilizing for war.

Nine entire hours had passed since the final edict had been released. Everything was a storm of activity every minute, because soon Talen himself would be right here at the gates, and there was zero indication he’d be even verbal or capable of speaking to any of us.

The Icon had quickly adjusted to her new role as the commander of humanity itself. According to her reports back to Urs, the war was currently keeping the machines on the back foot.

Most humans really did band together in the darkest of times. Some still took advantage, some ran, and some lost all hope immediately. Most of those weren’t warriors and there wasn’t any real loss of power with them going off. They couldn’t help much already, and the Icon suspected the lack of being able to do anything of actual impact was where the hopelessness came from.

But the rest that could do something? Generally for the positive. A few tried to turn on humanity and negotiate with machines to swap to the ‘winning side’ and that worked out exactly as poorly as expected.

The Chosen were the only ones who had any chance of doing that, but unless they were directly under the orders of a Feather who remembered to use them, they went by largely forgotten.

I don’t think their odds of survival were any higher. If Relinquished wiped out humanity, she’d also be killing them all with a wave of her hand.

And speaking of goddesses commanding massive movements from lofty thrones, anyone with Relic armor or near a terminal of some kind connected to the digital sea was getting individual orders from the Icon. She had the processing power to command every single human one at a time, all at the same time. It was impressive the amount of tactical weaving she could pull off.

And the picture she painted was all over the place.

Local police in most undersider cities remained behind to keep order and protect against any machine incursion, while each city sent off a few hundred relic knights, supported by their local imperial chapter, and then several more hundreds of auxiliaries. Soldiers with only rifles and weapons that would handle standard enemies.

Those were the core of the Icon’s forces. Undersiders, and Imperial crusaders. She could rely on them to almost always follow her direct instructions.

Othersiders were putting aside their differences, but they were real leery of the orders sent by the Icon. They knew they were terrible scum, and they didn’t trust a ‘goddess’ of humanity to look kindly on their actions in life.

Hate to agree with them, but they’re being smart. If I were the Icon, I’d be sending them deep into enemy territory. These were slavers, so them killing the enemy or getting killed themselves was win-win to me.

The Icon was more conflicted about that one, not wanting to waste anyone’s life, no matter how undeserving they were, but the Othersiders themselves made the decision for her by not following her orders and just attacking any machines they decided they wanted to go after. Being unpredictable to both our side and the enemy side was their solution to not getting sent out to die for humanity.

Clans were in the opposite direction. They were practically suicidal according to the Icon. If she didn’t deliberately order them to retreat or scheduled their rest points, they would remain in the fight without ever stopping to the absolute last man or woman standing.

They were fanatical, following any order she sent without even a hint of question.

So of course, they were perfect to hand off one of humanity’s current ace in the holes: To’Sefit’s plates.

Replicated several thousand times, hand handed off to clan knights all across the world. The Icon could plan out optimal routes, firing solutions and coordinate multiple factors all together. But only the surface clans were methodical, trustworthy and disciplined enough to reliably follow through on every last detail she needed no matter how insane or unexplained they ended up being.

Ergo, perfect for working with the spears. And it also served to cow the Othersiders into order too. They saw what those spears did and how the clans were using them to eradicate the larger enemies. Often just seeing an airspeeder do a drive-by, slice the biggest boy of the enemy incursion, and then race off to help another side, while the rest of the smaller machines were to be picked off by them or regular auxiliaries.

Not to feel too smug about it or anything, but I took a little bit of pride in knowing we were her best soldiers out here on the field.

Anytime there was a mission where she could not afford anyone to panic, run away, or fail to execute the task exactly as outlined - it went straight to the clans.

The fight was dragging out the absolute best and worst of humanity, and the Icon wielded both like a weapon in her hand.

The problem was that all sides were throwing out their best. Machines that were hiding deep within the far stratas below, kept safe for a moment like this, were… well, brought out exactly for this moment.

And they were terrifying. Weapons of war, ripping apart even the land as they passed by. As in they would rip apart the ceiling stratas and climb upwards, until they broke free onto the surface like a mountain.

A good amount of those targets were left for the replica staffs, because nothing underground was strong enough to break them.

But a larger amount of chaft could be handled in different layers, and the ones that made it all the way to the surface didn’t always get the To’Sefit special.

Thus, a first line of defense underground had appeared and they would be engaging the more conventional targets, whittling down the majority of the machine advance with regular weapons before the larger incursions made it to the surface.

The surface was still the surface. Meaning few human soldiers could fight there. So anyone without armor but still able to hold a rifle was part of that first line of defense. Softening up the machines on their warpath. Carrying out strategic hits to break down equipment and logistics being brought up.

The vast majority of the imperial army had managed to make it up there in the few hours since the call. And with them came all the treasures they’d been hoarding. A lot of it was very specialized, so the Icon was running those units on a case by case basis.

Usually getting a squad of crusaders with a relic picked up by a clan airspeeder and ferried around to wherever they could best be used in the local area.

She was basically playing the world’s deadliest game of dispatcher. Where hundreds of situations were appearing every second, and she had to problem solve who to send and when.

But there was a solid chokepoint that she worked around: The air between land and orbit.

Relinquished needed surface to orbit weapons, which turned out to be difficult to get in a world she’d already completely ripped apart for any weapon that were remotely dangerous like that.

Besides very few of her larger units, there wasn’t much she had that could actually punch into the fortresses above. She had to get her forces up there and construct weapon sites directly.

All the while the Icon would spot, and rip apart those plans either at the start, midway through, or right before the launch sites would have been operational. Sometimes she didn’t even destroy the sites, and would instead send covert operations to break key items that would render the station useless for a few more hours until better ordinance could blast the site into oblivion.

And by that, I mean the fortresses. They’re all really good orbit to surface weapons in the end.

Old programming up there was waking up, targeting downwards, shooting anything machine. The fortresses were clever about it too, moving to the beat of the Icon’s own movements, almost like a ghost listening to a dance partner. She didn’t have a direct line of communication with the satellites, Tsuya had made sure to cut herself off from those for security reasons. But the programming she left up there was doing an excellent job at automatically adjusting.

The stations would zip around, adjusting their orbital pathways on the fly, targeting sites and machine incursions that the Icon had no forces nearby. From what Urs said, it was almost eerie how well the old platforms adjusted and fought.

The third platform though. Talen’s Fortress. The real center point of this entire war.

That one was the one equipped to magnify the terra forming beam, and the only chance we had to kill Relinquished for good.

And of the three platforms, it was armed to the teeth, and beyond just deadly. Talen really hadn’t messed around when he came to do the modifications for that. He'd added a ton of extras that weren’t in the design docs we had.

One of Relinquished’s stronger units broke free to the surface, and focused a massive destroyer beam at the fortress. At that distance, the atmospheric dispersion would have made that beam mostly melt some of the outer structure but it wasn’t expected to actually knock the fortress down, so the Icon had allowed it to pass upwards, and had instead planned to eradicate it later on, once she had more forces nearby.

The details are a little sporadic since there wasn’t anyone nearby at the time, but we know the fortress actually deflected the beam completely in a shield of occult that pulsed around it, and then it fought back and melted the entire enemy along with a half mile chasm on the flyby.

Those fortresses did not fuck around.

But if this was a chess board, this would be like a king piece. Powerful, but not something to rely on.

The real answer to Relinquished’s strongest units, and the largest surprise to humanity and machine kind as a whole: The not-so-humble guild warlocks.

Holding onto their true power secret, to the point even Tsuya had thought they hadn’t held anything of real power besides politics, when there wasn’t any more reason to hide their true power, they went all out.

Every single guild actually put their differences aside and joined up with the imperial church, fully explaining most of their skills and tactical abilities.

If master Hexis were here, I think he’d be actually proud of his old hated peers. They came out, spewing lighting and power unlike anything the machines were prepared for.

A single one would turn the entire tide of a battle according to the Icon. Getting them spread out evenly across the globe was the harder part compared to actually winning the battles they were dispatched to.

But they were enough of a pain in the ass that Relinquished had to directly send Feathers to handle the warlocks, and those… would get intercepted by none other than their old enemies: The Deathless.

There were thousands of them. As in every godsdamned Deathless in the world had come back up from their fights underground.

Not just veterans. Legends. The real demi-gods. The sort of Deathless that ended up being the source of some songs.

Many of which hadn’t been seen in centuries.

I know this myself because some of those legends had appeared right here, walking up to the Citadel. Like moths to a flame.

One veteran was below me, past the stained windows, waiting in the courtyard outside with a thousand mile stare. A man named Tiberius.

He was old. Not just old-world old. This a Deathless from the first generation of Deathless. The ones right after Talen and Urs. Around seven hundred years old.

He'd fought in the dying embers of the original empire, and probably fought side by side with the protofeathers themselves.

Not much was known of the first generation, but I could just feel the occult radiate out of Tiberius even this far off. He was the real deal, and had basically flattened any machine between him and the Citadel on his walk here.

Only the Icon had his name on Tsuya’s records. Apparently he’d been such a danger in his time, Feathers were forced to start hunting down everyone around him, forcing him to go down into the layers and wander around here in exile in order to keep those he loved safe.

Centuries of solitude. And now he was back.

We haven’t been able to get much out of him, he had a hard time speaking and what did come out wasn’t quite lucid. Most of our questions were simply answered with a flat stare.

The Icon had a good theory: These ancient Deathless had been traveling alone for so long, the ones who forgot to speak out loud to themselves to keep in shape would inevitably only speak to themselves in their mind. So when we asked questions, they were answering, just in their heads since that’s how they had gotten so used to talking.

They forgot they needed to speak out loud basically. It was a little surreal how different they behaved.

And he was just one of many. They’d never died after all, they had to be somewhere in the world.

Seven more had come after him to this citadel, each alone. Some were lucid, and had been lucid this entire time. A few were clearly on their last screws, but part of them was still there. Aware enough to know to come here.

The less lucid had simply traveled back up to the surface, and became everyone’s problem. Mostly. They didn’t attack humankind, but didn’t follow orders either. To the Icon they were additional map modifiers that could be worked around.

Incredible fonts of occult power though. Where they walked on the surface, machines were usually crushed up in very creative ways. They’d require two or three Feathers to put down, which felt like a complete inverse of what the norm had been thus far with three to five Deathless to handle one Feather.

They were apparently the second most effective weapon the Icon had available, with To’Sefit’s spears and warlocks coming in tied for third place.

First place, without contest, was Clan Altosk.

Anything my old clan went to war with was wiped out. Anything.

The Icon was almost using Lord Atius and his knights exclusively to hunt down the larger units that couldn’t be stopped by anyone. As she told me, they served as a giant delete button.

Didn’t matter if it was a whole army of Feathers, an army of massive elite monsters, or just a much larger army of more regular toasters to kill. Clan Altosk always came out the winners, so long as she wasn’t dumb and sent them off on solo missions to be killed off.

Which she didn’t do. Those were missions for regular clan knights. Altosk knights were used for one real purpose: Feather duty.

They were basically their natural predators. Feathers weren’t talking to one another much with the machine network down, and too busy trying to show off to those who were near enough to speak. So when Altosk knights showed up, acting like normal knights, the Feathers would inevitably get baited into a bad position, and realize with very quick and brutal calculus, that they were not in fact fast enough to avoid a knight moving with a temporal distortion fractal and guns that could eliminate their shields flat out.

It wouldn’t last forever, eventually the Feathers would start to get together to warn each other that some human knights with certain sigils were to be handled with extreme caution, but until then, Clan Altosk was eating good.

I hoped Kidra and the others were keeping themselves safe, those were still Feathers. I knew the knights could survive a lot more past death, but I’d really like to win and survive all of this and still have my friends and family to go home to.

“The last Crusaders are arriving, escorted by twenty nine Deathless.” The Chaptermaster spoke. As I’d learned his name was Titus. Which seemed incredibly fitting for an Imperial in a way all surface clans could immediately understand. “Communication with the Icon indicates that no additional reinforcements will make it after this. The machine wave has been spotted approaching the Citadel. Anyone else will hit the wave on approach if they made the attempt.”

Which led us to our current problem.

Relinquished had heard Urs’s final edict as well. And she was mildly upset about it. Upset enough to send just about every possible machine within the nearest five stratas put together. The wave was gathering up beyond the biome, receding away to gather.

None of us needed to take a guess at where they’d be coming.

Urs spoke, still attached to my back as a husk. “That is fine. The remaining reinforcements are not being wasted. I have good faith the Icon will find use for them on the surface. For now, we will be alone in the coming battle. Seal the gates after their arrival.”

“As the emperor commands.” Titus saluted, turning his helmet to the others.

Outside the massive stained wall window, I could see the group of relic knights marching every two minutes to slowly make it to the citadel. We had a full army of thousands here.

And outside on the courtyard, the Winterscar knights alongside the rest of the imperials here were getting everything prepared, right next to the first generation Deathless standing by.

“Any updated bets on how they’ll hit us?” I asked. We already had talked hours over tactics, but each hour the Icon learned more about the machine capabilities whenever Relinquished unveiled something new in her arsenal.

“Relinquished will terminate the pillar heart first.” Urs said. “We have reports she’s done so in multiple cities and nearby pillars, generally to prevent first generation Deathless from respawning nearby.”

The first generation Deathless, according to the Icon, would return to life within minutes of being killed. Other Deathless like Atius were said to take about an hour, but she hadn’t yet seen Atius killed, just other Deathless from his own generation instead so it was an estimation.

“So, who had the pillar hearts on their bingo sheet?” I asked, because I was certain someone in the war room had pointed those out as a weak point and lynchpin to humanity’s effort at some point during the discussions. Of course the machines would try to break those first.

I just thought she’d try to break them physically, not turn them off remotely.

“She has control of Tsuya’s keys and networks, thus she’ll be able to target any non-mobile structure.” Urs said. “We should prepare for Feather incursions to make it within the citadel before the machine army arrives.”

Feathers were still Feathers. And they could sprint real fast. They’d probably sprint through half the biome before two minutes were up, and maybe even still be able to make it during the storm wall passing through. Out of all the machine enemy, they’ll be here first, the vanguard and the leading strike.

“We’re spread out well. We should handle it just fine.” I said. “Plus, if the Icon’s information is correct, Altosk Knights are the hard counter to Feathers out here, and we have the best of the best right here with us.”

“I suspect the numbers we will face are greater than those found on the surface, and forewarned of your abilities. Although I do appreciate the optimism.” Urs said.

“I will order the deathless forces to pair up and escort the Winterscar knights.” Tius spoke, relaying the orders. “We will have the frontline of the Citadel evenly prepared for any assault.”

We’d managed to collect an entire two hundred and seventy three Deathless, from across all generations. A few more were appearing at our pillar heart, but as recorded, that would be shut down pretty soon by Relinquished when the wave came to attack.

Some even knew Lord Atius, as colleagues from the same time period. Which was five hundred years ago.

Funny how all my life growing up, I assumed Atius was ancient beyond measure. But the more I learned about the timeline of this world, the more I realized he was rather new. Five hundred years old was closer to the first generation Deathless, but still two hundred years younger. Which is an insane amount of time.

“They will be used as occultists primarily.” Urs said. “The Icon has learned how to best use the first generation Deathless by now. The ones capable of following orders will be supporting us from the backline.”

We were lucky enough coming here was a deliberate choice they had all made, which only the more lucid ones were capable of.

“They’re closer to that upper rung of power, aren't they?” I asked, looking down to the courtyard where one such relic of an older time was floating in the air, meditating. Waiting. I could feel the occult pulsing out from her even this far.

“Correct. At their level, they wield the occult itself as a weapon. Similar to A01 and the protofeathers after him. You too would have eventually joined their ranks, given your current skills. It is a shame you do not have the years to develop those refined skills. You would have been among the more powerful ones, I am certain.”

“You hear that Wrath?” I said, looking over to her. “I want a raise after all this. I’m special. The only remaining god of my childhood faith says so himself.”

“You are being silly, human.” She tutted. “I would not have chosen you as mine if you were not.”

“The Imperial Warlock Chapter with us will assist, however they are not to the same skill and power as the guild, the Icon has been informed.” Titus finished his report. “They’ve adapted to what you’ve offered, Master Winterscar, and will be paired with the Deathless who specialize in longer distance combat.”

“The best use of them we have.” Urs agreed. “This will do against the Feather wave. We will adapt as the situation progresses.”

The guild was where all the knowledge and excellent warlocks went. The ones who couldn’t make it in the guild eventually came to the Church instead as a consolation prize. So we unfortunately didn’t have the best of the best here compared to master Hexis.

But we still had something to work with. And I’d been trying to teach them some quick fractals that we could reuse for the defense. Simplicity was key here, I didn’t want to overload the defenders with brand new tactics and planning compared to what they’ve trained to handle.

And speaking of, it was time.

A squire came by, rushing up to the Chaptermaster to whisper in his ears. It wasn’t really needed, a single comms notification would be a lot faster and more direct, but Imperials had their traditions, and it was good for moral that everyone had something to do.

Titus nodded, then turned to incline his head to Urs. “Machine waves are on approach, sealing the gates now.”

Ahead, I could see the fortress seal up. The final group of Crusaders passing through, escorted by the Deathless they’d come here with.

We were officially alone now, minus whoever appeared from the pillar heart returned to life.

“ETA?” I asked, finger tapping my blade. Nine hours into the final battle of humanity and we were by all expectations, somehow keeping it together.

“Twenty minutes.” Titus said. “Master Winterscar, you should move to the sanctum. We cannot afford to have you out on the fields early on in the fight. Not until Talen arrives.”

That’s the part that wasn’t quite so fun about being important: I couldn’t be out there on the off chance some machine nobody sniped me out of the air. Not likely to happen of course, but if the chance wasn’t zero, I couldn’t gamble.

Urs needed me for the fight against Talen. And he needed basically all the Winterscars as well but not to the same degree.

And then I got a signal. A comms signal, directly aimed at me.

And from the logs, I could clearly see who it was trying to hail me one on one.

To’Avalis.