The Lesser One Chapter 10: Greenfingers

Greenfingers

As my hand turns greener and greener, the tank we are riding on takes us closer to where the balrog is rampaging through the city.

“What is this, a Godzilla movie?” says the tank commander, whose front half is sticking out of the hatch. “Left!” he yells.

The tank takes a left. We are getting even closer. A couple of lesser devils are in our way.

“Smash them!” yells the commander.

“You won’t be able to kill them!” yells Esla, back at him.

“We’re not trying!” yells the commander.

Corbin looks afraid. “We didn’t get to absorb the ring of the devil we just killed,” he says, his voice almost drowned by the noise.  

“Why is that important?” I yell, over the sound of the tank’s engine.

“I don’t know,” says Corbin. “I have a bad feeling about it.”

The tank swerves around another intersection. I didn’t know that tanks could move like this. With a fierce increase in speed, we bowl over the three lesser devils that are in our way. At the very least, tanks are big and heavy with lots of momentum.

The tank’s main gun swivels and fires at one of the devils. The round smacks into a shield of magic and sends a rain of sparks falling onto the ground.

The three lesser devils begin to chase us.

Three adventurers appear from out of a doorway and engage them. A couple of seconds later the tank turns again and I lose sight of the conflict.

“Where are we headed?” Esla yells to the tank commander.

The tank commander says something into his mic. Then he turns to Esla. “The front lines! We’ve got a command to get as close as possible!” He signs with his hand, and then looks back at us. “We’re carrying some valuable cargo!”

“Tell us about it!” yells Esla.

“We can’t!” yells the tank commander. “It’s top secret!”

“If we knew, we’d be able to help!” yells Esla.

The commander thinks for a moment. Then he gives Esla a headset connected by a wire. He gives one to me and one to Corbin as well.

“We have a big stinker that can pierce magic,” says the commander. “But it needs to be guided because of some stupid rule of magic or another.” He gives another command to the driver and turns back to us. “We’ve got the guiding platform.”

We take another turn at high speed, trading paint with several parked cars. Sparks fly from the contact of metal with metal.

We pass another tank going in the opposite direction. The commanders of both tanks salute each other.

The balrog’s feet appear between two buildings. It turns the corner towards us, belching fire from its two heads and setting the buildings around it alight. A crowd of lesser devils spread out in front of its feet.

“We’re going to have to hit it on its head,” says the commander, through the headset I’m wearing. He looks around. “Where the hell are the Rangers?”

He holds his hand to his headset—it appears he is getting info.

“Well damn,” says the commander. The balrog takes a step closer. It seems to have noticed us. “The Rangers got knocked out,” says the commander.

Esla looks at me, and then at Corbin. “We can do it,” she says.

The commander thinks for a moment. Then he nods. He reaches down into the tank and pulls out what looks like a bulky laser pointer.

“Hold the dot on the monster’s head,” he says. “You’ll need to be at least twenty stories up.” He hands the device to Esla.

Esla rips off her headset and gives a thumbs-up. I take my headset off, and so does Corbin.

“Good luck,” mouths the commander.

The three of us nod. We jump off the tank at the same time. The tank backs away as soon as we hit the ground. The balrog is a block and a half away, moving towards us.

Corbin kicks in the door of the building closest to us. He points to the interior. “I’ll stay here and keep the devils out!” he yells.

Esla nods. She and I enter the building and start climbing stairs.

I’m happy that I’ve been working out lately. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to keep up with Esla. As it is, I barely manage to stay behind her. We reach the twentieth floor just as the balrog passes by the building we’re in. Esla holds up the laser device. There’s a timer. A minute and twenty seconds. She runs to the nearest window facing the balrog and points the laser at the spot between its horns. I make sure my bow is in its place on my back.

A green dot appears on the balrog’s head. Half a second later, it looks straight at us. It stops. Taking a single meaty hand, it rips out the floors below us. The ground begins to tilt. I hear steel groaning.

Esla manages to keep her balance, and keep the dot trained on the balrog’s head.

The balrog rips another floor out beneath us. I am losing my footing, but manage to lean against a pillar and stop my movement.

Esla is not so lucky. She slides towards the window, feet first, and hits the glass. The glass shatters and she falls out. Grabbing the ledge with one hand, she uses the other to toss the device.

“Catch!” she yells.

I catch the device—a feat I have never done before in my life. Holding on to it with my free hand, I point it at the balrog’s head.

10

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The roar of a huge jet aircraft blossoms overhead.

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The balrog smashes the building with its side, sending ripples through the concrete.

My hand is now completely green. I can see the whites of the balrog’s eyes.

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1

A blast of fire with the intensity of the sun rips through the air and impacts the balrog right where the light was shining. Molten metal and rock flies everywhere. The balrog reels. The pillar I am leaning against collapses, sending me sliding straight towards the firestorm in front of me.

I am in a life or death situation.

I am near a huge monster.

And I don’t even care about what will happen to me next as long as I survive.

I knock an arrow to my bow. The fire around the balrog slips down its body, revealing a patch of its head where the red crackling slade armor has been broken. The balrog is still very much alive, and is turning to me with its gigantic, devilish eyes.

My anima vision spots a tiny point, where the missile has hit, about the size of a penny, where the balrog’s very essence is exposed.

I fire my bow. My entire body turns green, and I suddenly am convinced that I am a papaya. A piece of fruit sliding off of a grocery store shelf.

My arrow buries itself inside the balrog, diving deep. The balrog’s eyes go wide. A light switch flicks in its brain. It staggers, rips some holes in the buildings around it, and stomps on a tank. The flames around it erupt in a display of fireworks that shoots hundreds of meters into the air. The balrog moans, roars, and then collapses to the ground. I slip off the tilting floor and float into the open air.

I am aware of everything. Yet, I know nothing. A beam of light cuts the balrog’s body. A blood-red ring floats out of its chest, spinning, and wraps around my stomach. I am floating, not falling.

Unimaginable power flows through me. My entire being explodes into magic, pain, and the pure essence of reality. I scream without making a sound as I float towards the ground.

I land on the ground with a bump. My vision snaps back into focus. I am no longer a papaya, and my hands are back to normal—except for the blood-red cracks running through them. They shimmer with a starry radiance, almost as if they are alive. Esla kneels beside me.

“Caught you,” she says.

I stand up. We are not in a good situation. At least fifty lesser devils surround us, climbing over the body of their master, spilling out of alleyways and dropping from the buildings above.

A stirring of power erupts in my chest. I embrace it. It begins gathering in my hands, a glob of deep blue energy that contains the fury of a thousand lightning bolts.

The fifty lesser devils do not approach us directly. They form a circle around us, chattering to each other in whatever language they speak.

One of the devils approaches me. I do not know what is going to happen—all I know is that they are not attacking.

The devil bows before me, lowering itself to one knee. “You have defeated our master,” it says, in a guttural, rocky voice. “You have absorbed his soul. We are now yours to command.”

“Um …” I say.

Esla turns to me, her eyes wide. “You killed the balrog?” she says. “Not the military?”

“The military softened him up,” I say, confusion filling me. “But I was the one who killed him.”

The devil in front of me lifts its head, though it is still on one knee. “My name is Jirgrar,” he says. “I am at your command, as is my legion.” He points to the ball of lightning in my hand. “If you wish, we shall store ourselves away within your personal dimension.”

“Personal … ?” I say.

Jirgrar bows. “Yes. I smell your power. It was not an accident that you killed our previous master.”

I hold up my hand. “Okay then,” I say. “I guess you guys can … Do whatever it is that you do.”

“As you command,” says Jirgrar.

I lift up my hand, looking at the ball of plasma in my palm. A light shimmers deep within it. All at once a hundred beams of curved light shoot out from it and surround the devils around us. As one, they shiver, twist, and disperse into blue light that collects in the object I am holding.

There are no more devils. The sounds of battle fade away.

I know the count of devils within me instantly. There are two hundred and fifty-one of them, comprised of five different types. I will probably learn more about them later.

Esla looks to me. “You should, uh, probably not tell anyone about what just happened.”

I get the feeling I am being watched. “Yeah,” I said. “Keep it secret for me.” Esla nods.

The tank that drove us here peels around a corner and stops in front of us. The balrog’s body lies on the street, leaking fiery energy. The commander of the tank pops out of the top hatch and looks at us, shielding his eyes.

“You lads did it!” he says, his voice carrying over the quiet landscape. “You killed the balrog!” His squints. “I guess the brass made a good investment, eh?”

I look at Esla, and she looks at me. We both nod. The missile killed the balrog, not I.

Esla holds out the glorified laser pointer. “Here,” she says.

The commander climbs off of the tank and walks up to Esla. He takes the laser pointer from her. “I’m going to recommend all three of you for a medal.” He looks around. “Where’s the tall guy?”

“Right here!” yells Corbin, hanging out of a broken second-story window. He jumps out and slides along a cloth awning, landing on the ground. He walks up to us and leans on his steel rod.

“I just got done fighting a devil. All of a sudden it disappeared.”

Esla looks at me, and I look at her. We don’t have to talk to each other to understand.

“When the balrog died, it took all the devils with it,” says Esla.

Corbin looks at the burning landscape around us and whistles. “Whoa. That missile or whatever sure did some damage.”

“I’m just glad it worked,” says the tank commander.

“Hey!” yells a voice from half a block away.

I turn around to face a group of adventurers who are approaching. All around us people are popping out of the woodwork, some adventurers, some soldiers, and a couple of civilians.

I can’t identify any one guild, but I can recognize several of the faces. These are all powerful, well-known adventurers.

Mr. Tuffman is among them. He approaches me. “I recognize you,” he says. “You’re with the Riding Valkyries, aren’t you? What are you doing here?”

The tank commander puts himself in between me and Mr. Tuffman. “This boy and his two friends allowed the military to kill the monster. You should be praising them.”

“What happened to its spirit circle?” says Mr. Tuffman.

Esla looks at me for confirmation. I nod.

“Markus is the one who held the laser,” said Esla. “So I’m pretty sure he absorbed it.”

“But you shouldn’t be able to without a ceremony,” says Mr. Tuffman. “The body is still here!”

As if on cue the body starts to crumble.

I take this as my indication. “Dr. Barrimore gave me a potion yesterday. You can talk to him if you want to know what happened.”

“Dr. Barrimore?” says Mr. Tuffman. “You mean that hack who thinks spirit circles should be given to bad spirits?”

“Well, you guys can test me,” I say. “I absorbed the circle, and I think my powers changed. A lot.”

The tank commander waves an arm between us. “We should carry out this conversation later. We need to notify someone of what happened.”

“Don’t worry about that,” says an adventurer behind Mr. Tuffman. “We have that covered.”

A couple of police helicopters pass overhead. More and more vehicles are arriving at the scene. Two news vans screech around and corner and stop next to the fast-decaying body of the balrog.

A dozen cameramen and reporters climb out of the vans and approach the group of adventurers around the balrog’s body.

“Alex Rim!” says one of the reporters, shoving a microphone in front of the face of one of the more famous adventurers in the party. “Who was the one to land the killing blow?”

The tank commander pushes his way through the crowd, displacing Alex Rim. “My name is Lieutenant Anders. I can tell you that the government deployed a secret weapon to destroy the balrog. Since this young man here—” he points to me—”was the one to point the guidance laser, and the missile was fired by a drone, he was the one to absorb the, ah, spirit circle.”

Mr. Tuffman nods his head in understanding. “I don’t know how that would work, to be honest,” he says. “We’ll have to do more research. In the meantime, we need to get in contact with the doctor who caused this … Bizarre transfer of energies.”

“That was Dr. Barrimore,” I say.

Mr. Tuffman nods. He turns to the camera. “It looks like, as in a dungeon, the monsters dissipate once the boss is dead.”

I nod my head along with the story. The reporters then turn to the rest of the adventurers. I assume they know that the people on TV want to know about their favorite celebrity adventurers, not some rando like Mr. Tuffman or me.

The tank commander—Lt. Anders—claps me on the back. “You did good, kid,” he says. “I’ll recommend you for the highest award an adventurer can receive.” He turns to Esla and Corbin. “And you guys too. I know how much you helped.”

“I didn’t do much,” says Corbin.

“You held off the devils while we were climbing,” says Esla. “That deserves an award.”

I sink to my knees. “Guys, I’m kind of tired …” The expenditure of energy I had made, as well as the scare of almost dying, has taken me over.

The world fades away and I feel a pair of arms surrounding me. “Thanks, Esla,” I say, as I fall asleep from exhaustion.