FULL NOVELXO Chapter 23: Confronting the Emperor
Confronting the Emperor
A soldier burst into the throne room, slamming the doors behind him. The Emperor sat on his throne with a very sour look on his face. He heard the commotion outside the throne room and the alarms wailing. “What’s the meaning of this intrusion!” he roared at the soldier.
The soldier fell on his face crying out, “We are under attack, sire! The rebels led by the mutated outlander have managed to breech the fortress! They are everywhere! They came out of nowhere slaughtering any who oppose them!”
The Emperor bolted from his throne with a look of incandescent fury. “What! That mutated bitch is here?” he bellowed.
The soldier shook, scared to death as he replied, “Yes, sire; she’s here! The Captain and the human gladiators have turned on us and Nemesis and Magnus are wreaking havoc! Even your pet has gone crazy, killing anyone who comes near the torture floors and the lab! The Cadre cannot stop it!”
The Emperor bellowed like a beast enraged. His eyes glowed as a fireball formed instantly in his hand, flying to the poor soldier. He screamed as it reduced him to ashes in less than ten seconds. The Emperor threw his crown down and turned around. Reaching behind the throne, he grabbed his sword, pulling it violently and throwing the scabbard aside. “I will finish this myself! No one attacks me in my own house!” he roared, rushing toward the doors. With a great leap, he jumped from the dais seventy feet towards the door, landing on his feet with a thud that reverberated in the throne room. As he approached the door, it exploded into splinters, and the fury of mortal combat poured into the throne room with Hanna and Nemesis driving the guards before them like cattle. Half a dozen Cimmerians and the hybrids backed them, slaughtering the guards that resisted. The explosion threw the Emperor fifty feet, stunning him briefly.
After getting over being stunned, the Emperor jumped up, roaring, “How dare you defy me! I am eternal! I shall eat your souls myself and feed your rotting corpses to the god-worms!”
The Emperor’s rage got everyone’s attention and the battle suddenly ceased. The Cimmerians and hybrids saw the Emperor for the first time and feared as he rushed forward in a fury, killing his own people as he went. When he saw the hybrids, he stopped in surprise for a moment. The guards that defended the throne room fled in all directions. Hanna shouted to the Cimmerians and hybrids, “Get out of here, now!” They didn’t hesitate, but backed away quickly, falling into battle almost as soon as they got out of the throne room.
The Emperor’s fury then fell on Hanna. The moment he saw Hanna, he hesitated with fear rising in him for the first time in his very long life. Blood and gore from the battle enhanced Hanna’s ghoulish, charred appearance. The deadly gleam of her berserker rage flashed in her eyes as she glared back at the Emperor with an icy smile. Then the Emperor saw the Caverias sword in Hanna’s hand and his mouth fell open in surprise.
Nemesis saw his reaction and shouted, “He’s afraid of you, Miss Beowulf. Exploit it now!”
Hanna moved forward menacingly, her sword in a traditional Hasso samurai position with Nemesis circling around to the right. “We can take him together, Miss Beowulf,” Nemesis growled.
Suddenly, the fight forced Enoch into the throne room from the main hall. He hewed down three guards before seeing the epic confrontation. He rushed forward and circled to the left. “I’m with you, little sister!” Enoch growled as the Emperor stared in fear and disbelief, seeing Enoch come in.
“YOU!” the Emperor hissed at Enoch with recognition, seeing him wearing Thoth Caverias’ armor. “YOU are responsible for this! Now, I end your wretched line forever!”
In an instant, the Emperor’s rage pushed him toward Enoch with the speed of a cobra. In less time it took for the Emperor to close the distance between him and Enoch, Hanna transposed herself between them, soundly blocking the Emperor’s strike with a high sweeping block with her sword. “Your fight is with me, Black Prince!” Hanna hissed as she batted the sword away. In less than a second, she spun around in a flying roundhouse kick, hitting the Emperor square in the belly, sending him sprawling across the floor.
The Emperor bellowed with rage, smashing his fist into the floor as he rose, morphing into the Black Prince in front of everyone, yet retaining his twelve-foot height. This dumbfounded Enoch, who had never seen such a transformation before. “How dare you!” the Emperor roared as he rose from the floor nearly thirty feet from Hanna as she settled into a defensive stance. “You fucking mutated bitch! I am eternal! I am the Destroyer of Worlds! Worlds without end have fallen to my hand! I am the end of all that is!”
“Keep that fucking forked tongue behind your teeth, Black Prince!” Hanna hissed, her berserker rage pegging into deep into the lethal range. “I didn’t come here to be lectured by the likes of you! For my whole life, you have haunted my dreams and nightmares. You are done…do you hear me? I did not war with Lord Baal through fire and darkness in the chasm of Acheron to bandy wits with a piece of witless demon shit like you! I didn’t take his fucking head on the Isle of the Devourers along with Dagos and the Devourer to be bullied by the likes of you! You stupid goddamned prick...you made me into what I am now. By doing what you did, you unleashed powers in me that you can’t comprehend, or control. I am the Caverias reborn...the Last Caverias, and now I will take back what you’ve stolen from my ancestors and humanity. You have no more power over us, you fucking malignant demoniac sow!”
The Emperor’s mouth dropped open in surprise at Hanna’s vicious insults. “You will die for that arrogance!” he snarled viciously. “No one speaks to me like that!” In an instant, he threw his sword directly at Hanna. To his utter shock and surprise, Hanna sidestepped the blade as if it was sitting still, catching it by the blade in midair without it cutting her hand. The catch stunned both Enoch and Nemesis as Hanna looked at the Emperor with a truly amused look.
“Oh, come on, your most un-royal majesty. Surely, you can do better than that. Here, try again,” Hanna chuckled icily. With a heave, Hanna tossed the sword back to the Emperor.
The Emperor caught it as they began to circle. In seconds of his catching the sword, the Emperor shrieked, “I’ll show you what I can do, you mutated bitch flea!” They engaged and the battle raged all over the throne room while Enoch and Nemesis made a perimeter. Hanna held her own against the Emperor’s vicious attack, taunting and keeping him off balance. Finally, the Emperor got in a lucky punch, connecting his fist with the side of Hanna’s head, sending her sprawling. Enoch called out in concern as the Emperor pounced to finish Hanna off. He brought his blade down with all his might to cleave Hanna in two from head to crotch as she got to her knees with her back to the Emperor. In a flash, Hanna’s blade came up and blocked the blow, stopping it cold, and shattering the Emperor’s blade from the force he used. At the same moment, the Caverias sword flashed, sending out a powerful concussion blast that knocked the Emperor back. He didn’t have time to consider what had happened because Nemesis instantly tackled him to the floor after the strike and concussion hit from the Caverias sword.
The broken handle of the Emperor’s sword went sliding across the floor as the Emperor kicked Nemesis off. He lashed out, connecting with Nemesis’ face brutally, knocking him to the floor and pummeling him mercilessly. The Emperor was about to finish off Nemesis when Enoch rushed him as Hanna got to her feet. The Emperor saw Enoch coming and turned, hurling an electrical discharge at him, sending Enoch flying back thirty feet, knocking him senseless for a few moments. “Puny mortal insects; you are no match for me! Time to end this!” he hissed as he turned back to Nemesis to kill him. “Die now, you traitorous piece of bear shit!”
“Hey!” Hanna boomed out as she faced the Emperor. “Over here, you overgrown pig-faced demon son of a bitch!”
The Emperor turned to the insult, giving Nemesis an opportunity to kick him off with both feet. The Emperor flew forty feet and crashed against the wall, stunning him briefly. He shook his head and then hurled a fireball at Nemesis as he struggled to rise from the Emperor’s savage beating. Instinct took Hanna as she drew back with the Caverias sword. It glowed icy blue as she timed the fireball while an icy blue aura swirled around her. At the critical point, Hanna struck with her sword and an icy blast came off the blade. The icy blast collided with the fireball four feet from Nemesis as he got to his knees, extinguishing the unholy fire, leaving a sooty snow floating in the throne room.
The Emperor gawked at the move as Hanna turned to him with a wry smile; the berserker rage firmly entrenched in the lethal range. “Seems I’m just full of surprises today,” Hanna crowed menacingly. “Try this, you goddamned son of a demon bitch!” In less than a second, she stepped forward with her left foot and clenched her left fist while holding the Caverias sword in her right hand. The floor crumbled under her left foot as if a massive hammer had crushed it. Her eyes glowed white and the air shimmered around her as her sword abruptly blazed like the sun. Suddenly, an energy blast shot through the floor from Hanna, aimed right at the Emperor. The floor shattered in a line as the blast traveled to the Emperor, sending debris flying. The Emperor crossed his arms and blocked the blast with an elemental shield, though the sheer force of Hanna’s elemental strike knocked him back to the wall with great force. A cry of pain escaped the Emperor’s lips, his back crackling as Hanna took a defensive stance and beckoned the Emperor with a flick of her left hand, saying, “Come on; let’s dance, you fucking demon shit!”
The Emperor’s face grew beet red with rage as he staggered forward a couple of steps. “We finish this now, you fucking mutated bitch! I’ll burn you to the ground!” he hissed venomously, eyes glowing bright yellow. Electrical energy surged from his fingers with Hanna as the intended target. In less than a blink of an eye, the energy crossed the distance. Hanna used a high defensive sweeping block on the charge as it hit the blade. The sword glowed as it amplified, and then reflected the energy directly back at the Emperor when Hanna struck directly forward from the defensive block when the surge hit the sword. The electrical surge returned to the Emperor amplified three-fold, hitting him square in the chest. It sent him flying against the wall again heavily stunned, unable to move as he fell to the floor. Smoke rose from the Emperor’s chest where the reflected electrical surge hit him.
“Wow!” Enoch breathed, seeing the counterattack as Nemesis got to his feet.
The move equally amazed Hanna. “How the hell did I do that?” she asked as Nemesis moved in menacingly on the helpless Emperor.
“This ends now!” Nemesis growled as he drew back with his mechanized claws to finish the Emperor off.
“No!” Hanna cried out. “Don’t do it! If you kill him now, he won’t learn anything. The Black Prince will just move into the next clone! Now is not the time to do this. We have others that demand our attention! Our sisters need us!”
Nemesis resisted the order, but after Hanna pleaded with him again, he backed off. However, Nemesis slashed the Emperor’s face with the claws on his organic hand, saying as he did, “Just a little reminder not to fuck with us anymore.” His claws dug deep, leaving four bloody gashes across the Emperor’s face.
“Nemesis!” Hanna scolded as Nemesis rose.
“I didn’t do anything permanent…just a reminder,” Nemesis growled.
“We need to finish this,” Enoch said, watching the door for more guards.
“Yes, we do. Come on; we have work to do,” Hanna ordered and they charged out of the throne room, leaving the Emperor alive and heavily stunned with a raked, bloody face. They dove back into the fight, heading for the Harem.