The Trembling Giant (4)
“Whoa?!”
The two devil worshippers recoiled in horror and lashed out on instinct. Even a trigger pull like a startled grazer’s twitch meant danger—these guns could empty thirty rounds in 1.6 seconds, blind fire be damned. Nimble as my men were, no one outruns a flexing finger.
But.
Click! The guns didn’t fire. Not a single one of the four they clutched.
“Guhk—!”
The forward one took a gut punch first. Almost at the same instant, the one a step behind had his waist snap at a right angle. Kyung-tae, who’d struck the rear guy, darted sideways and slammed an elbow into his ribs. The devil’s minion crumpled, face locked in a strangled gasp, sides caved in.
Kyung-tae and the crew pinned the whimperless wretches, stripped their weapons, chucked them aside, bound their hands, and gagged their mouths.
Treating the captives like baggage, Kyung-tae gauged their weight and flashed three fingers, then four, to his men in turn. The pair nodded and jammed confession-serum syringes into the devils’ exposed necks. Per Kyung-tae’s call, just three-quarters of the prepped dose.
Meantime, I scooped up one of the tossed guns.
Clack. Racking the bolt spat out the dud from the chamber. I snagged it midair. The live round’s base bore a crisp firing-pin dent. Impacted, but no primer pop.
My magic’s handiwork. A preloaded incantation had quashed the four tiny ignitions.
Phew…
I exhaled long and slow, easing tension from my frame. Expected or not, I’d been wired. First time deploying this spell in close-quarters chaos, no stable setup.
‘Shame it’s a trick I can’t sustain long.’
First shot’s the key. Autos jam on a dud, bolt cycling back and forth like a fool’s errand. Chain that, and any firearm’s scrap. My ignition block? Minimal mana, maximum denial. Prime tactic.
But only if the enemy’s iron’s inside my circuit’s repulsion field—my mana dominance range. Too far, or if they’re packing their own field as an awakened ability user, it fizzles.
I tossed the gun back, pocketing just the dud. Souvenir.
“Euuuugh—”
Hauled upright, the pair unleashed a weird duet of groans. Slack-jawed, drooling, heaving ragged breaths. My men grabbed their napes as they flopped limply.
Unlike Oakland, straight to serum first—hedge against fanatics. Screaming suicidals would draw heat. Info taint was the trade-off.
I waited for less spit and asked, “Satan’s faithful. Which cult are you with?”
“C-cult…? Cult?”
The minion rolled the word like it was alien. His trussed buddy grinned vacantly and answered.
“Ahh, cult… We’re the Worshippers of Arcturus…”
News to me. Can’t track every fringe offshoot of O7A’s global trash heap. Direct action cells or core cults, maybe.
But Arcturus—Arcturus, the Herdsman’s brightest star—in their name? Locked-in zealots. To devil cults, it’s the Dark God’s throne, autumn blood-sacrifice lodestar. Modern softcore Satanists ditched those rites ages ago.
“You said Worshippers of Arcturus.”
“Yeah… that’s us…”
“Just your cult in these woods?”
“Nah.”
“Nah? Other cults too? UK dispatch maybe?”
“Told ya no… How don’t you know…? X-being…?”
“Know what?”
“Didn’t see that fog, idiot…? We’re not alone here… Dark Gods descend with power… Cthulhu, Nyarlathotep, Atlach-Nacha, Arcturus… Oh, ma-jiq. Glory to eternal might, saintess, stars, and avengers.”
“…”
I’d braced for witch’s direct lineage crossing the Atlantic. This? Deflating sigh.
“Maa-jiq! Maaa-jiq! Maaaaaaa-jiq!”
Drool streaming, eyes glazed, he amped the chant, glee building. His sidekick joined the chorus from his heh-heh haze.
Answering fine, but this one’s dose was heavy. I slapped them quiet before it peaked.
“Maa-jiq…”
Guess ma-jiq’s their om-mani-padme-hum. Chant it, ascend realms.
“Dump this one. Useless.”
Kyung-tae dragged the overdosed fool back, planted a single round in his skull. Pop—muffled crack, splat of dark red. Corpse pitched forward slack.
I pressed the survivor.
“Who sent you here?”
“Obviously… our boss, you fuck…”
“Your cult’s will, or someone else’s?”
“Dunno…”
Serum downside: tanks cognition. Vague questions baffle. “Dunno” might be literal. Rephrase.
“Heard of Grace? Heptagonal Knights’ Grand Master.”
“Ahh, Lord Roundwytha Grace… Prophetess, saintess, our beautiful savior… Promised us the Millennium Kingdom… Jealous? Huh? Jealous?”
“Insanely. Did she send you to these woods?”
“Yeah.”
“…”
Short truths hit hard.
“What’d she order?”
Doped dimwit veered into faith spiel. Doctrines, meetups, beatings, murders, thefts, rapes, arsons—for Dark Gods’ joy. He parsed her gospel as “orders.” Context forgotten.
‘Why I skip serum when I can.’
Dumber the mark, worse it works. Pros sometimes spit lies mid-high. Cross-checks sniff truth eventually.
Sigh. Sharpen the probe.
“What did Grace order you to do here in these woods?”
Stressed syllables clicked. Proper spill.
“She bid us… guide the forest’s soul… to the Dark Gods’… unknowable realm…”
Witch’s retooled Satanism—cobbled dogma to swallow old cults. Unknowable realm: magic’s (ma-jiq’s) source. Guiding the forest soul there? Warp its mana growth.
“So we… drew sacred heptagram with victims’ blood… offered victims’ lives… paved paths for the woods’ spirit… Lotsa paths… Fun times…”
“Had to be humans?”
Fertilizer’s fertilizer—man or beast, same diff. Why risk live-sac hazards?
Foolish question.
“Humans…? Other sacrifices exist…?”
“…”
Right. Devil cultists. Brains pickled. Witch’s karma, stoking zeal with blood rites. Even I drag on org inertia sometimes.
Org culture demands reason.
“Anyway. Anything else from Grace?”
“Yeah. We get blessings… Blessings, ah, blessings. Eternal might drenching my soul…”
Not orders. But no idle babble. Spill from the directive. Her angle’s clear.
‘These too are fodder, differently purposed.’
“Eternal might” blessing means one of two: freak cancer, or soul-circuit pierced for powers. Or both—cancer kills anyway.
Assume Kyung-tae’s hunch. Awakened? Asset. Cancer death? Tumor mass. Immortal cancer breeds sans host, mana-fed. Self-fattening meat lump—perfect “live” bait for a forest that learned human flesh from corpses. Next step: true man-eating labyrinth.
Staged prey recognition. No guarantees, but worth her shot.
Explains no radios. Cancer hits varied—early screamer wrecks control on armed fodder.
Proof needs one thing: cancer-luring knack.
“Dunno. Dunno…”
UK parcel? Headshake. Drunk wobble. Rephrase loops, same denial.
“Itchyy… Untie… Gotta scratch… Hurts-and-itches… Itches-and-hurts… Hurt? Itch? Dunno… Crave mint-choco pizza…”
Thrashing ground-scrub. Serum fading—same root as anesthetic.
“Hoist him.”
Kyung-tae yanked nape-rough. I knelt eye-level with the squinting wretch.
“Hold still. Answer a few more, I’ll scratch for you.”
“Quick, quick…”
“Sure.”
Lowlifes know headcount, ranks, base, arms loadouts, passcodes, fallback drills. Milked every scrap, I rose.
“Enough. Time to deliver.”
“Deliver…? What?”
“Said I’d scratch your itch.”
“Oh yeah… Hurry… So itchy…”
“Step back, Kyung-tae.”
Bang!
Honest answerer got skull-scratched via bullet. Coolest itch-relief ever.
Faint cordite tickled nose; suppressor-muffled shot warped eerie in fog-buffer. Head snapped back, body slop-sprawled.
I eyed the unnatural brain-drain and said, “Looks like your guess was spot-on, Kyung-tae.”
“Which one, boss?”
“Feeding the forest humans.”
“Ah, that? But from what you asked—”
He toed the fresh corpse.
“—any leads on that?”
“Clues to infer it. Trade lingo, symbolic.”
I laid out my deductions. Kyung-tae barked a disbelieving laugh.
“Damn, that witch treats minions like disposables? Real devil queen move.”
“Minions, not faithful. And that Anglo hag wouldn’t touch these mutts.”
She’d despise them. Devil cults often moonlight neo-Nazis. Her Round Table of Light and Truth hate matched mine—no way she’d dote on empire’s bastard spawn.
Thus, O7A-led devil flocks were mere revenge tools to her.