Vampire Hunter D Volume 18- Fortress of the Elder God (15 page)

The rock wall was drawing closer. Though the warrior tried to push away from it with his right hand, the limb wouldn’t move. As he felt the right half of his face being crushed, Bierce lost consciousness.

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II

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The road didn’t appear to have an end. A dimension that twisted back on itself, a maze, sprang to mind, but apparently this road was different. All of this was the god’s abode. Nevertheless, D’s pace didn’t slacken, and no hint of fatigue could be seen in his handsome features. Even now, the solitary Hunter pushed ahead.

“What’s this?” the hoarse voice bubbled up.

It’d seen the line that rose obliquely from the stone floor far down the cobblestone road. From the shape of it, it was a longsword.

“Hmm, is that—tell me it’s not what I think it is,” the left hand said in a contemplative tone.

Presently, D stood beside it. Including the portion that was sunken into the stone floor, the longsword had to have been over twice as long and wide as D’s blade. The creature that adorned its hilt and guard was a dragon.

“This is the Sacred Ancestor’s sword,” D said.

“Wow. In that case, this must be . . .”

A sudden wind struck D’s face.

“This was the battlefield—where the Sacred Ancestor and the god fought.” As impossible as it seemed, the left hand, apparently gripped by fear, fell silent. After a pause, it said, “There’s no sign of the god’s corpse.”

“Yes, there is.”

“What?”

Its surprise was out of place in this eternal world, and the wind made a stirring sound.

“It’s under this,” D said, his gaze trained on the paving stones.

After a bit, the hoarse voice said, “Then that means the god was defeated, doesn’t it?”

“At the very least, it can’t move. If it could, the Sacred Ancestor’s army would’ve long since been swept away.”

“This is its grave? And that sword is a headstone?”

“Do you think a god can die?” D asked.

“What?”

“Let’s go,” D said, his eyes already focused far off in the distance.

“Hey, wait just a minute!” the hoarse voice said in an agitated tone. “If the god is under here and it still clings to life, isn’t this a golden opportunity? All you have to do is drive that sword in. The Sacred Ancestor’s sword. It’d be killed for sure, right?”

“I could do that.”

“Th—then why don’t you?” the hoarse voice stammered.

“The god is close.”

“What?”

The soles of the Hunter’s boots trod across the stone pavement.

“But that’s not my job.”

He must’ve been referring to the Sacred Ancestor’s ancient battle, which he was now walking away from.

“There you go, being pigheaded again. Make it easy for yourself—hell, why don’t you make it easy for me?”

The left hand knew there was no use ranting. But it continued its harangue just the same.

“You know, you’re always so—”

The tiny mouth that opened in the palm of the Hunter’s hand was merely getting started, but just then a voice rained down from the heavens.

You’ve done well to come here. This place was supposed to be sealed away, but it would seem you managed to break those seals, didn’t you?

The left hand let out a surprised groan—the voice pouring down on them was that cruel and horrible.

“Are you the god?” D asked, staring up into space. Apparently this young man could see things that weren’t there.

There are those who call me that—or rather, there were.

“Where are you?”

This was D’s sole concern.

Everywhere. Think of your favorite place. I am there.

Nothing from the Hunter.

Why didn’t you drive the sword into me? The truth is just as you said.

“I already answered that. If you aren’t going to come out, I’m leaving.”

Fine. I’ll show myself. But in return, I want you to agree to do something for me.

“No deal.”

Don’t be that way, it said in a voice that carried faint traces of laughter. Knowing that I’ve lost my arm, the enemy intends to attack at full force. They have weapons capable of destroying this shrine. Eliminate them.

“It’s telling you what to do!” the hoarse voice remarked with disgust. “A god that gives orders? You’re used to being pampered, aren’t you?”

If you can do that, I’ll meet with you.

“Oh, that’s an awfully big thing of you to say. Why’d you decide to do that, god? Aaah!”

The cry from D’s left hand was due to the overwhelming malice and rage that had slammed against every inch of the Hunter.

You’re just like him, the god said in a tone of loathing. The one being who came to me—you’re just like him. You realize that, don’t you? However, he couldn’t deal the coup de grâce. Can you?

“That’s why I came here,” D said softly. But amidst the maddened howls of the ever-growing wind, his voice still rang out like pure ice.

The floor shook ever so slightly.

They’ve resumed their attack. The darkness is truly their world. The humans are trying to flee. Scorn entered the god’s voice. I appeared because you didn’t rely on what he had done. We need to settle matters between us. After you stop the attack from outside, that is. Then you should come again.

A second later, darkness pressed in around D. It immediately cleared.

“Where the blazes are we?” asked the hoarse voice.

Crouching down, D tried to assess the situation. A glowing sphere had just passed overhead.

“That’s a recon globe,” the hoarse voice said in the absolute lowest of whispers.

To the Hunter’s right, innumerable figures were milling about above him. And also on his right—the sound of water. It was the river. D was in the gully that the river had carved. In which case, those atop the bank would be the Sacred Ancestor’s army. Since countless lights covered both banks, they threw illumination both on the river’s surface and up toward the sky, while among them flitted several glowing spheres resembling the recon globe that’d just passed by.

“Odd, aren’t they? The Nobility, I mean. Light can cost them their lives, but they’re still obsessed with it. Or is it just that they want to imitate humans? They even worked it into their machines.”

The nocturnal Nobility had no need for light. They could see as well at night as humans could when walking around in broad daylight. Moreover, 99 percent of their forces were synthetic humans. Perfect machines and technologically enhanced bio-men alike needed no light sources to assist their vision. Yet the fact that the Nobles had lights burning everywhere was in keeping with the hoarse voice’s second assertion—that they were imitating humans, as many scholars agreed. Though they regarded human beings as lower than insects and were themselves imbued with all the self-confidence and pride their ageless and immortal form could inspire, the Nobility still kept up this completely unnecessary mimicry of humanity. The solution offered by psychologists studying Nobles and humans was in keeping with the left hand’s opinion: The Nobility had a profound adoration of the human race.

At present, however, that sentimentality was only complicating D’s situation.

Off in the distance, there was a heavy sound like a bell tolling.

“That’s it,” the left hand whispered, but by this point D was already weaving a path through the recon globes and scrambling up the earthen bank. It wasn’t a gentle slope he was climbing, but rather an almost-vertical wall—in fact, he might’ve chosen that overhang to conceal him from the eyes of the enemy.

At the top of the gully, there were rows of countless synthetic combatants, ranging in type from humanoid to fortresslike. Though all were equipped with green eyes, those eyes would never register any emotion at the scenes conveyed to their electronic brains.

Reaching the top of the gully, D began to weave through the robots like the wind. They and the recon globes constantly scanned in all directions. No matter how swift D might be, he could never elude them.

The pendant on D’s chest gave off a blue glow.

At some point, he’d come into the thick of enormous mollusk-like constructs. One of them quaked. An indentation formed about a third of the way up it, a head and four limbs took shape, and in less than two seconds’ time it produced nearly a dozen men. They had no eyes, noses, or mouths, and while their fingers hadn’t formed yet, they did soon enough. The featureless, semitransparent figures joined the rest of the ranks, vanishing into the darkness.

“They’re changing shifts,” the hoarse voice noted.

Unlike robots or cyborgs, these synthesized humans returned to their original state when they weren’t on duty. That was the mollusk-like mountain.

“Are they lookouts or part of an attack? Whatever the case, leave it to the people who could move a planet or two to fall back on old-fashioned methods like sending out wave after wave of bodies to do battle. I just can’t figure those Nobles out.”

The voice flowed on the breeze, and less than a minute later the Hunter was in a position where he could see a colossal dome guarded by several rings of sentries. Lasers and searchlights shone on its gray walls, sliding across its sloping exterior.

“So, there are automatons in addition to the synthetic humans. There’ll be trouble if they find us.”

Not waiting for his left hand to finish speaking, D weaved between the gleaming black mecha men and went straight to the dome. When a squad of synthetic humans came along, he pressed himself up against its wall and became one with the darkness. Even after the guards had passed, D didn’t come back down to the ground, but rather slipped along the curve of the wall.

After running about two hundred yards, he halted.

“Okay, this is good,” the hoarse voice decided. D must’ve found an entrance.

A black-gloved hand touched a spot on the wall. Without a sound, a perfect circle six feet in diameter opened in it.

Climbing down off the wall, D reached for the sword on his back with his right hand, then twisted his upper body around to his right, swinging his blade low.

Split from the head to the chest, tumbling backward, was a synthetic human carrying a stafflike weapon. Two arrows jutted from him, one through his throat, and the other through his heart.

“That you, D?” a voice called out to him, and then Bierce popped from the darkness.

“What are you doing?” D asked, his tone and the look in his eye fit for addressing the enemy. This man wasn’t supposed to be out here.

As he scanned his surroundings, Bierce said, “It’s like this: As soon as the enemy assault started up again, an assassin from the Sacred Ancestor’s army came after us. I couldn’t take him, but at the last minute an incredible wind came through, and we were blown all around. I blacked out after I hit a stone wall, but somehow we managed to escape. Everyone’s in the underground shelter. But if this attack keeps up, the fortress won’t last till morning. So I came out here to destroy their weapons.”

“Alone?”

“That’s right. The rest of ’em wouldn’t be any use.”

“How’d you make it this far?”

“I was kinda worried about that too, but once I started, it was easier than I expected. Thanks to this.”

He stuck out his left wrist and turned it over. What he wore looked like a wristwatch or an ultracompact device for monitoring vital signs.

“It’s a sensor guard. It might not be much to look at, but its performance is top notch. As far as those androids’ eyes are concerned, I’m an invisible man.”

D glanced at the warrior’s wrist, and then turned around. Bierce was about to tell him to wait, but instead he just grinned wryly and followed the Hunter.

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III

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After Bierce went through, the circle immediately closed. Discarding the corpse of the synthetic man he’d cut down, D pointed straight ahead. On top of a tremendous ten-foot-high dais, a lone man sat in a chair. Right in front of him loomed a construct that closely resembled a silver jungle gym, and the man wore an exhausted expression as he leaned back in his seat. A hand protruded from one sleeve of his long, dark blue robe, and it gripped a glowing metallic rod.