Overpowered Wizard

The Blood Prairie Savages’ strong hold and ancestral home centered on an immense skull that dwarfed the nearest castle mountains and fortress hillocks.

It was wedged between four such low-lying mountain structures while resting upright on its upper jaw. Each eye socket had bone scaffolding where their main defensive force lived.

There was more scaffolding around the bleached-white cranium of the immense skull-home. More defenders looked out in all directions of the stronghold.

There were mainly two ways in and out while ancient blocks of the hardiest black stone covered the back and sides. There was a winding road leading to the gap between the front teeth. And there was the secret underground passage hidden in the caverns down below.

Down in those caverns, a majority of their gnoll population lived, either resting or serving their people in some way. The blood pits were down there too where their young killed off the weak and left only the strong. Ezda had hoped Reiki would help with that by getting them a homebound dungeon, but that seemed less likely now.

At least the road leading to the front of the stronghold looked nice where mammoth-bone posts and silver decorations reflected the few sun rays beaming past the mountainous castle tops surrounding the skull home. On the mountain towers and elevated ramparts, gnoll scouts and warriors peeked down at the divine visitors.

Ezda knew right away that things were different based on the reaction of her scouts and archers. They were hesitant to have their arrows in hand.

Ezda would kill any fool who aimed directly at their very important guests, but it wasn’t foolish not to have weapons out. But she saw all the archers put them away for some reason.

She saw how they looked away from the Floridians, as if they couldn’t stand to gaze upon them. Then she looked directly at the Floridians and felt … uneasy … like she was looking at monstrous predators instead of human adventurers.

First, Ezda examined Naomi, Hannah, and Bianca. They rode on top of a magical metal wagon with six wheels that rolled forward without the need of a work-animal to pull it.

Naomi seemed even more formidable and mighty, like a massive giant shrunk into a human woman’s body, losing none of her true physical might.

Hannah had a cold and dark look in her eyes that made Ezda feel like something to be dissected.

Bianca, who had taught Ezda about fashion, cuteness, kindness, and human sensibilities, smiled in a manner that made Ezda feel deeply afraid of upsetting the princess.

Looking down to the ground, Ezda saw how Gilbert rode on his mighty and fabled steed like they could dash forward and crush anyone in their way.

Then Ezda landed her eyes on her new god and saw how he made the world make less sense.

His cloak, Para, wavered about him in dark red and ragged streams that shone with thousands of little lights like she’d eaten many stars out of the night. The surrounding atmosphere was dark and tense. Sparks appeared from nowhere. Miniature cyclones spun to existence and died with little noise within a few heartbeats. Thick strings of electricity crawled over the wizard’s body.

The pressure in the air grew heavier and heavier. It was like having a storm pass over them. And within the eye of the storm was a calamity of the highest degree instead of salvation.

The scary part was how Ezda could tell this wasn’t from the powerful darkness inside of her new god. This was from his mortal powers, which he had improved immensely from when she’d last seen him.

Ezda could almost believe that the current Zarian could defeat the Greater Boon Avatar without his unstoppable darkness.

And yet, she could see that her god was hungry for something. As if he was hungry to grow more and more powerful. And this reflected in his chosen ones. They all were hungry for more and more power.

It was almost too much to bear.

Ezda felt unworthy.

So she looked at someone more unworthy than her.

“Do you see now, MagMag? This is why we must leave Killall!” Ezda hissed before her new god and his chosen ones stopped in front of her.

MagMag opened and closed her snout. Then she looked past Ezda. She looked past their new overlords and overladies. MagMag looked into the distance above.

Ezda turned to follow MagMag’s gaze and saw a vengeful reckoning only Evil God Killall could throw down from God Land.

“Look what you’ve done, Ezda, you fool,” MagMag hissed. “Now Evil God Killall will KILL US ALL!”

There was a burning rock falling upon them that was large enough to demolish the skull, strike underground, and kill everyone within the caverns below. Many more gnolls would survive, but they would lose their leadership and become easy pickings for their greatest rivals and the monsters of the Blood Prairies.

Killall was truly mad to do this with his boons.

Even with divine attack still a distance away, Ezda felt the heat of the flaming mountain of reckoning. She felt the pressure of evil divinity that could only belong to Killall.

She remembered how that bloody and edgy pressure cut her every time she led worship at the altar of the Murdersome Ravager, the Unrelenting Killer, Evil God Killall.

She remembered how she would leave rituals covered in her own blood, her vitality struggling to heal her, leaving her in pain for hours or sometimes days, all to please the Evil God.

Zarian had never done that to her. He had only wanted to help her and make her grow stronger. He even wanted to help her gnolls and make their lives better than before.

Could he help them again?

Ezda turned to her new god. “Help us, my alpha!”

“No prob,” he said with a casual shrug. Then he disappeared from view and reappeared higher above the stronghold.

The chosen ones didn’t panic. They only looked up to watch. Ezda followed their example as many of her gnolls lost their nerves and acted in ways unbefitting of their reputation.

Even MagMag fell to the ground, crying, afraid of death. Ezda walked past them all and stood with the chosen ones. She still held the core to her chest as she looked up.

The burning rock wasn’t too, too large. It was only the size of a small mountain. But the speed and power it contained with its angled descent would cause immense damage to the stronghold and kill many.

The One True God of Absolute Killing looked like a speck while floating in the path of the burning rock of destruction.

“What if he causes the apocalypse again and there is no coming back?” MagMag cried. “Killall is mad! He would rather us all be destroyed than to accept the power of the Dark Lord! A power that is unstable and too dangerous!”

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“He won’t use the darkness,” Ezda said calmly. “This is nothing to him.”

Ezda caught Naomi’s intense gaze. The Rumble Psion rewarded her with a small smile and a head nod before looking back up.

Ezda’s confidence bloomed as her new god seemed to hone his focus and grand powers before … doing something Ezda couldn’t quite grasp even with high stat points in Mysticism.

The best way she could describe it was that her new god was yelling something silently, and it came out as a gushing river of sky-tearing darkness that expanded widely like a cone.

By the time the front of the dark, void cone struck the front of the burning rock of destruction, Ezda felt like her flesh was scalding and splitting at the same time because of the divine rage of Killall.

But that was mostly it.

The burning rock of destruction gradually faded away from the front to the back as Zarian’s grand wizardry washed over it. It was an incredible, never before seen sight. But the timing wasn’t perfect.

There was still some leftover that nearly ran into Zarian. But the destructive attack of Killall seemed much more trivial now.

The true god lashed out with massive tentacles formed from his cloak. They snapped forward with giant whips covered in dark and powerful magic. The cloak’s tentacles cracked apart the remains of the falling rock.

Fragments hurtled in different directions, sent careening off course.

They crashed all over the Blood Prairies. The earth shuddered and bucked and quaked from the barrage of broken divinity raining from the sky.

None touched the gnoll stronghold.

Ezda felt the heat of elation and adoration burning in her chest. She reminded herself not to shower him with affection for his mighty work. She also heard the gripes of the chosen ones, which was shocking.

“He forgot to use the scroll,” Gilbert muttered. “I’m not wrong here, right? I remember he had a scroll for this situation. He forgot to use it.”

“If he was a second too late, this could’ve turned out as a travesty,” Hannah said.

“Hmmmm. I think I could’ve split that in half when I hit my peak,” Bianca said. “But that’s about it. I should train for that, right? Naomi, let’s add that to the training list. Let’s call it Bianca’s Meteor Split Practice.”

“Terrible name. But sure, I’ll keep it noted,” Naomi grunted.

Ezda looked at them in confusion. The other gnolls who were overhearing this were even more confused than Ezda.

After some thought, Ezda concluded this was normal for the Floridians. She’d overhead them act nonchalantly before, after all. Yet, it still felt shocking after Zarian had used his mortal abilities to defeat a double-boon from a major Evil God. All while in a territory that Killall had once ruled over supremely.

The One True God of Absolute Killing fell from the sky and performed a majestic landing. His cloak returned to a more reasonable form and flapped merrily behind him.

“Well?” Zarian asked.

“I give it a seven out of ten because there wasn’t enough fabulous dancing,” Bianca said.

“Five out of ten. Should’ve used the scroll to stop that ball of fake-revelations,” Gilbert grouched.

“Six out of ten. You took a little too long against the dino-slayer,” Hannah said.

“Seven out of ten. I would’ve scored higher if you punched it,” Naomi criticized.

There was a tense few seconds where Ezda thought the alpha elder god would rampage in a rage. But then the Floridians all burst into chuckles and laughter, as if they hadn’t besmirched the reputation of the One True God of Absolute Killing and everything was in jest.

Evil God Killall would’ve taken all of their heads and hearts for anything he perceived was disrespectful.

The other gnolls looked in confusion at the Floridians. They slowly turned to Ezda, looking for her leadership, unsure how to proceed with this highly unusual and frightening first impression.

Ezda thought about groveling, but she used her limited and more humanized intellect to discover that maybe she didn’t have to crawl around in the dirt for the Floridians. She still avoided being untoward as she addressed them as casually as possible.

“Very good showing, my … friends! I knew that Killall’s double-boon power was no match against you,” Ezda said, trying to copy some of the showmanship and enthusiasm she’d seen from Baron Ekri.

She felt nervous and a little sweaty when the Floridians looked at her strangely. Then her alpha elder god and Bianca broke out into a cheer.

“Sorry if we caused some trouble with our arrival, Elder Ezda,” Zarian said.

He grinned at her in a way that was both mischievous and welcoming. He was a naughty god in human form, but he treated her kindly even when she acted foolishly many times before.

“You look so cute! That’s the dress we picked out from the market, right? I love it. I also love the silver thingies you’ve hung up. Was that all for us?” Bianca waved at the road decorations, looking soft and less fearsome, almost as if she could cause no harm.

Ezda felt like she was in a dance she’d never known she could dance. She tried her best to act like them by being casual in the presence of absolute power.

“No apologies needed, my alpha. And thank you for your kind words, Bianca. There aren’t many gnolls with my shifting power, and our home is made for the living of gnolls,” Ezda said. “But I hope your stay here will be a great one. I’m most excited about the blood rites for all of you, especially the Alpha Blood Rite for Elder Zarian.”

“I’ve already done it,” Naomi said. “It’s pretty badass. I got to be a sigma elder.”

“There can only be one alpha and one sigma,” Ezda said, trying to hide her nervousness behind her smile. “But the rest of you will be official elders of the Blood Prairie Savages nonetheless, after the blood rites.”

“Hm, yes, I see, but first, Reiki.” Hannah jumped down and landed with a heavy, ground-smashing thump.

She moved so aggressively, Ezda feared she’d made a colossal mistake again and earned Hannah’s wrath. It was too late to do anything when Hannah stopped suddenly and her aggressive approach disappeared.

She moved so fast! But isn’t she the crafter of their party? Why did she feel so strong and fast and dangerous when she approached me?

Ezda feared she was acting too casual. Maybe she should fall and grovel before Hannah.

The other gnolls were still holding their heads down. Some were even on their knees, looking in awe and fear of the Floridians.

Then Naomi released a blast of intimidation that made a chill pass down Ezda’s spine. The sigma barked, “We’re in a civilized setting, Hannah, not the training field. Ease back on that body skill of yours or I’ll teach you how to do it the hard way.”

Civilized? Ezda questioned. But the name of our unified clans has savages in it.

Hannah looked back in annoyance. Then, with a sigh, she looked up to Ezda with a softer gaze. “Sorry, I’m still getting used to some new changes in my … approach to adventuring. It’s been illuminating for me. I might be a little harsher than normal.”

She took the core from Ezda and turned away, becoming absorbed with the pearly head-sized orb. Ezda almost wanted to ask what was happening with Reiki but decided not to interrupt the intense and cold woman, who could be much stronger and scarier than a mere crafter should be.

“I hope everything is okay with Reiki,” Ezda said, glancing at Naomi. “She’s stayed this way since the Fortress Bear Dungeon.”

“Oh, that’s the one you recommended to me before, huh?” Zarian flew inches above the ground and stopped to hover in front of Ezda.

He didn’t bother raising himself up to have their eyes on level or his above hers. He allowed Ezda to look down upon him, as if the stature of one’s height meant nothing to him, even if he was the smaller man.

Truly, the wisdom of the alpha elder god was beyond reproach.

“Yes, it was that dungeon. I told Sigma Elder Naomi about it, and she insisted on going there. After we finished, Reiki ate the dungeon core. I was quite confused by that, but Sima Elder Naomi insisted Reiki knew what she was doing,” Ezda explained.

“Yup, I stand by that. Reiki knows what she’s doing.” The sigma nodded.

“Well, before Hannah over here gets too far in doing her egghead things just like any nerd who doesn’t get out enough, she needs a shower. Oh, I guess I need a shower as well, but don’t mind me. God only knows I smell like roses compared to these heathens,” Gilbert drawled, speaking in funny and sacrilegious ways that tempted the anger of the Infinita Gods, good and evil.

But that was the nature of the freedom alignment, and Ezda was part of that alignment as free evil +1. So were a large majority of the gnolls.

She suspected many more would turn over to free evil soon after the annihilation of the burning rock of destruction, a double-boon that had gone to waste for Killall.

“Excuse my, uh, manners. We have rooms prepared for you based on human accommodations. We even have baths! They are very new and clean baths! Very good for humans!” Ezda waved them toward the gap between the front teeth of their giant skull home. “How long will you stay?”

“One night,” the alpha elder god said. “We have to keep pressing forward. We have more training to do. And we have a critical asset to save from Grimrock.”

Ezda sharpened her wits as best she could. “I remember our original arrangements spoke of an offensive against Grimrock with my gnolls. However, I was not absolutely forthcoming about all the complications.”

“Oh? More lore? Do tell, Ezda,” the alpha elder god insisted, as she led them and their strange magic metal cart into the stronghold.