Chương 11: Star-Element: Earth

Of the Four Heroes preceding the current era, the First Hero alone demonstrated absolute dominion over terrestrial, earthen matter in all its known states.

Contemporary records, though fragmented, consistently describe his talent not merely as 'earth manipulation' in the conventional elemental sense, but as a far more invasive authority—one that extended into his extremely intuitive understanding of the structural integrity of all landmasses, the latent pressure hidden beneath tectonic plates, and even the very cohesion of soil itself.

Accounts from the Battle for Relikov City document that entire mountain ranges were raised in moments without any observable preparatory phenomena, while opposing demonic forces were entombed instantaneously beneath layers of compressed strata exceeding natural geological density. Survivors' testimonies further note that the terrain exhibited a form of reactive obedience in the First Hero's presence, shifting preemptively to intercept threats before any visible command was issued.

To this day, many scholarly debates persist regarding the origin of his earthen prowess. They posit that the First Hero's immense talent with the earth may not have been derived from his elemental affinity alone, but from a deeper, more personal resonance with the 'foundation layer' of the world. The mana leylines, in more colloquial terms.

Perhaps that was why Scholar Hina Hima tentatively named him the 'Godsent Geomancer', though even she eventually conceded the term was insufficient to capture the true extent of his talent in working the very earth to his desire. … And to think the successive Heroes would all turn out to be stronger and even more blessed by fate than him? Ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous. How strong would the Fifth Hero be, then?

—Excerpt from the opening of 'On the Elemental Authorities of the Pre-Fifth Era', Volume Two, Written by Scholar Osar Al-Nur The middlequarters had become a slaughter-yard by the time Orland caught up. The Vodyanaya Thread Street he'd known as clotheslines, carts full of wet dye barrels, and old women haggling over the thinnest of threads and fabrics had turned into a mess of shattered carts and half-demolished buildings and screaming people— lots of screaming people.

Blood splatters and puddles spread so far even the salt in the cobblestone cracks had gone dark. The God-Sucking Leech was in the middle of it all, enormous and sickly pinkish under the night lanterns. It bounded on its four gangly limbs from one side of the street to the other with incredulous speed. It smashed through stalls and awnings without even seeming to notice them, and when one guard squad rounded a corner to charge at it, spears and swords raised, it just swatted them aside and sent them folding in half.

Orland kept running at it anyways. Bodies that the leech completely wrecked during its rampage, it ignored. But the few bodies it managed to keep somewhat intact, it dug its thousand teeth into and began gorging, sucking, and drinking. As it consumed more and more blood, its giant body began to pulse in ugly ripples from mouth to tail. It wasn't just his imagination. It was getting bigger and bigger by the second.

Its skin stretched, its limbs elongated, and while it may have once been the size of a small house, it was now on its way to rivaling the Belograd Manor in size. What'd the nobleguards say this morning? God-Sucking Leeches can grow and heal themselves incredibly quickly whenever they drink blood? As it finally reached a distant crossroad connecting the middlequarters to the noblequarters, it suddenly anchored all four limbs deep into the ground as it raised its mouth to the sky.

Its head lolled around in a small circle, as if swirling something inside its mouth, and the motion confused him. It perplexed just about every other evacuating townsfolk as well. A second battalion of guards came in from a side slope with shields now, spears levelled, trying to close in before the beast could strike again—but then Orland's danger instinct flared. He almost shouted at the guards to stop running at it, but he was too late, and they were too slow.

The leech snapped its head at them and spat a whole wave of blood at them. It was dark and undeniably toxic, roaring down the street and burning straight through the four unfortunate guards even with their shields raised. They barely got to scream before they were melted through, skin and bones. Even Orland, who was running at the leech from several blocks away, had to throw himself behind an overturned cart as droplets of toxic blood splattered nearby. The blood ate through wood. It chewed into all stones.

Half the buildings that wave of blood had scraped by was now completely reduced to rubble, and as he peeked out at the leech down the street, his heart was absolutely pounding with fear. It's strong. That was such a stupid thought that he almost wanted to slap himself. Yes, obviously, it was strong. It was an Uncommon-Grade monster the town had contracted the Hero to kill. But knowing it was strong, hearing it was strong, and actually seeing it be strong was a completely different matter.

If I'd actually gone with my original plan and tried to fight all three of them myself this morning, would they have used this attack? His stomach clenched hard. He knew he had to move soon, but… fear. Real fear. It pinned his knees and refused to let him get out from behind the cart. C'mon, think first! Think! How can I possibly beat this thing for real? There weren't any giant lions nearby, he assumed. Nor were there any giant deposits of stone overhead he could collapse and try to crush it to death.

He gritted his teeth and wracked his head, thinking, thinking, thinking— But the leech, still recovering from its first blood spray, slowly turned its head down a side street on the crossroads. Orland followed its gaze and felt his stomach drop. That side street wasn't empty yet. A cluster of townsfolk stood trapped there behind a wall of debris that'd fallen before them, pressed against each other so tightly they could barely find a way to flee. There was an old man. A mother clutching two children.

Two bricklaying apprentices in aprons. A tailor, maybe, as well as faces he half-knew and didn't know. And Milena. She was there in the middle of them in her noble dress and fine shoes, terrified and pale and very, very far from the manor.

"What are you doing here?" he muttered. But the leech had seen them too, and its throat started to swell again as it anchored all four limbs into the ground to brace for the recoil. No time to deliberate. Orland ran. He dashed out from behind the cart, poured mana into his sylph shoes, and jumped straight onto another cart before a burst of wind from his shoes launched him up onto the edge of a nearby roof. He landed badly, slid on loose slate, but caught himself before he could slip. Hurry!

He kicked forward again with a second burst of wind at his feet, leaping the gap to the next roof. Then the next, then the next, dash, jump, burst, land. As he neared the leech and the side street where Milena was, he heard the thick wet blood physically churning inside the leech's throat, and it was a grotesque, horrible sound. The trapped townsfolk had nowhere to go and nothing to do but hug each other and shout in terror. One last jump.

He hurled himself off the edge of the roof and landed heavily right in front of Milena. He punched his gauntlet up as he landed, and the earth answered. A whole wall of stone and packed ground tore up from the street before him—just as the leech screeched and released its wave of blood. Impact. The wall shook so hard his shoulder jarred even as he braced against it. The wave of toxic blood washed over it and around it, splashing around all of them in hot black-red sheets. Some of it hissed over the sides.

A few men grunted behind him as a few drops splattered against their arms, but soon the barrage ended, and everyone was still alive, though their hands were still clamped over their ears and their eyes were squeezed shut. Orland whirled at once to face Milena, who'd fallen to her knees. She was shaking in fear, eyes wide in terror, but she was still staring at him like he was some saint.

"I was… you just ran off down here," she stammered.

"S-So I came for you, trying to see what you were doing, but then that thing… and I—""Take the rest of them and get out of here!" he snapped, jerking his chin at the townsfolk behind her.

"Lead them to your manor! Go somewhere high! Somewhere safe!" And he was already turning back towards the wall—already thinking about getting the leech's attention away from anyone else—when Milena snatched his hand. Her fingers were shaking.

"Don't leave," she whispered. He glanced back at her. Tears had welled up in the corners of her eyes.

"Protect me, please." He frowned.

"You don't need protection. You're the governor's daughter." He tried to pull free.

"Help the townsfolk and get outta here already—""Don't!" she said.

"Please! Let's just leave them! Carry me back to the manor first! I can't… I can't stand! She looked down at herself then, and Orland followed her gaze. Sure enough, her knees were trembling so violently she could probably barely stand, much less run for the top of the town. The fear had gone all the way into her bones. Ordinarily, that might've moved him. But there was still the giant leech in the crossroads before him, recovering from its blood spray, and people were still screaming across the town.

"... Tch." He clicked his tongue and scowled, yanking his hand away from her. That got a shocked stare from her, but he didn't bother with her anymore. He turned towards the largest man he could find amongst the crowd and pointed at him instead.

"You there!" he shouted.

"Can you carry this girl up to the Belograd Manor?" The man looked around hesitantly, as if wondering whether the Hero was talking to him or not, but then he nodded shakily when he realized there was no one else but him.

"Then go the moment I lure the leech away!" Milena still tried to grasp at his hand, but he leapt up to the top of his earth wall before she could get a good hold. The townsfolk were all looking up at him now, frightened and filthy and desperate for an answer he had no business giving—so an answer he gave, because that was what a Hero would do.

"Over here!" he roared at the top of his lungs, clenching his gauntlet and raising it to the sky.

"You're looking for me, aren't you?" The leech was reeling from the recoil of its own attack, its head swinging low and drunkenly, but the moment it heard his voice, it turned towards him. And Orland saw it see him. Recognition. That was what made his skin prickle. The leech remembered exactly what happened this morning, and it remembered the Hero who'd run while its companions were ripped to shreds by that giant lion.

Its ringed mouth of a thousand teeth widened in a silent, furious gape, and in an instant, he knew it'd crawled all the way into Rusalka through the sewers—through all that stone and filth and darkness—because it wanted revenge. It wanted him. And as long as he stayed in its sight, it wouldn't turn towards anyone else. … Probably. But that's good enough. The leech started barrelling down the street, claws gripping the buildings beside it for better leverage. He didn't try to outrun it immediately.

Instead, he planted his feet, poured mana into his gauntlet, and visualized ripping a boulder out of the ground before him as he performed the motion. A moment later, a sphere of earth and stone the size of a small cart lifted into the air, and he hurled it straight at the leech's head. His aim was true. The boulder connected with a heavy crack, making it stagger sideways and screech in outrage. It wasn't down for the count, but that was fine. He hadn't expected it to fall over anyways. He just needed time to run.

His sylph shoes burst with sharp pushes of wind as he turned and bounded from one roof to another, luring the leech behind him. People still lingered in windows, under overhangs, and behind corners everywhere, stupid with fear and delay, so he shouted at them as he hopped by. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"Move, all of you! Get out of the way!" Then at a knot of guards trying to rush in from a side lane with spears braced and no plan worth naming, he shouted even louder.

"Don't interfere with me! The Hero has this covered!" He didn't wait to see if they listened. The point was speed. Jump, burst, land again—the leech was still gaining behind him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw it clipping corners and running into buildings as it chased. Twice he had to punch him and raise earth walls to stop it from throwing random debris at him.

The walls exploded after each impact, so twice more he raised earth walls as he hopped across the middlequarters, buying himself space by forcing the leech to bash through them each time. His destination: the town square, where the great central fountain rose with a sharp tip above the bubbling basin. The tip was metal. He knew that much even with just a glance from a distance, but the base of that giant tip was stone, which meant he could control it. That first wall took… what, ten mana to make? Around ten mana?

It'd felt like a ten-mana wall. Then he'd thrown what felt like a ten-mana boulder and raised four more walls, which meant… sixty mana spent? Add all that with his sporadic bursts of wind with his sylph shoes, each use costing three mana, and then considering he only had a mana capacity of about a hundred and ten last he checked… Damnit, he wasn't good at maths, but even he could tell he was probably running low. This next attack will be my last!

As he finally hopped down and screeched to a halt before the fountain, he looked behind him to check if the leech was still on his ass. It very much was, roaring all the way from the end of the street. Do it now! He thrust his gauntlet at the base of the fountain and visualized ripping the entire thing up from the ground. The earth under the square started to split. Cobblestones groaned and cracked. The leech continued advancing, getting closer and closer.

He grit his teeth and jerked his gauntlet up, hissing with phantom muscle strain as he blew through his remaining twenty or so mana—and then the heavy fountain tore free with a grinding roar.

"Eat this!" he shouted. And just as the leech was about to ram into him and swallow him whole, he punched forward and sent the fountain along with it, metal tip going first. The leech impaled itself on it. The spear-tip punched through the front of its mouth and into the rest of its giant body behind it, and then he kept his gauntlet forward, pushing it deeper into the beast's throat.

Screams, rasps, and spasms rocked the leech's body as it immediately slumped, but it was still sliding towards him, so his eyes widened before he reacted on instinct, jumping up with his sylphs shoes to vault over its body. As the leech slid into the town square and came to a slow halt, he landed on the street behind it, panting hard. For one second, two seconds—maybe even three—he almost smiled. … Did I do it? Is that all it takes? The answer, unfortunately, was no.

He gulped and took a step back as the flesh around the leech's wounds twitched. Then, the flesh started pulsing. Closing. He could only stare in utter disbelief as the leech slowly pushed itself up, grinding and crushing the spike in its mouth before it began to chew on it. No way, he thought, taking another step back as the God-Sucking Leech regenerated completely, turning around slowly to face him. If even that didn't work, then how do I— From the side, a streak of frostfire snapped across the square.

A curved blade struck the leech's head before either of them could turn to see what was going on, and the leech recoiled, screeching in anger as the blade was quickly yanked back out by a long chain. Orland followed the blade back to its holder, and there, standing in the mouth of a side alley in a plain cloak, was a scar-riddled middle-aged man he recognized too well. Kazimir.

The disgraced captain took another step out of the alley, limping with his right leg still, and whipped his frostfire chainblade forward again. This time, it lashed the leech across the side of its head hard enough to send it slamming into a nearby tree, cracking it in two. Then Kazimir reached into his cloak and pulled out several fizzling-blue vials, popping their corks and downing them in a sequence of single gulps. Orland didn't need an introduction to guess what they were: mana restoration vials.

The frostfire on the chainblade probably cost mana to maintain, so it dimmed after every few swings and then flared whenever Kazimir replenished his mana. How many vials does he have under there? He's just downing them like—"All townsguard in the area, stand and move!" Kazimir roared.

"Gaurd the common man and clear the streets!" Though dismissed from Belograd service, he still sounded like command itself, and the guards hiding behind cover around the square—guards Orland hadn't even noticed himself—immediately obeyed their former captain. They gave up arms and rushed away from the square, heading towards civilians, some towards barricades, some dragging the wounded.

A few looked uncertain until the leech screeched at Kazimir, and the captain's chainblade cracked through the air again to send it recoiling. The man was fearless. Utterly dauntless. He was a fraction of the size of the God-Sucking Leech, but he advanced steadily, yanking and jerking and whipping his chainblade across the square in a flurry of sapphire arcs to drive the beast back.

The leech was regenerating faster with each successive attack, yes, but the man was driving it back—and whether buying time was the intention or not, that gave Orland time to think. It barely even screamed when I drove an entire fountain into its mouth, but it's making this much noise every time Kazimir lashes it with frostfire. It's… just a big leech after all. Of course it was. Fuck that story the nobleguards told him this morning about how God-Sucking Leeches were once cosmic beasts that fell from the stars.

All those rumors about them sucking at gods and getting cursed into ugliness were bull—the truth was, they were still leeches, and what did leeches hate more than anything? Lightning striking the water they resided in would hurt them, naturally, but so would fire…" … And salt," a young man whispered. Salt. He whipped his head uphill.

Down here in the middlequarters and deeper down in the slums, most of the salt had already been harvested this season and was waiting for regeneration two seasons after, but no traveling merchant could possibly buy all of their stock so early into the summer. No amount of trade between Rusalka and the nearby towns could drain all of their stock so early, either, which meant up there—in the noblequarter warehouses run by the salt merchants—there were still mountains of salt.

Plan in head, fear in chest, Orland moved before either could argue with the other.

"Kazimir!" he barked, leaping back onto the nearest roof with one final burst of wind from his shoes. His mana was truly exhausted now—he could feel the emptiness in his chest.

"Leave the leech to me! Milena's somewhere nearby, so go and make sure she's okay! Also, can I have a few of those mana vials?" Kazimir looked up, frostfire chainblade still hissing in one hand, three mana vials still fizzling in the other. His face tightened into that same hard scowl Orland had come to fear, and it was evident the man still didn't believe he was who he was claiming to be. Orland could see that plain as day—but this wasn't the foyer, and this wasn't a duel.

The town was choking with a giant leech smashing through it, so Orland met the man's stern gaze and held it.

'Help me,' Orland wanted to say. … And whatever it was he saw in Orland's face, the disgraced captain decided their little quarrel didn't matter right now. He ripped his chainblade free from the leech's neck with a brutal yank, tossed five whole mana vials Orland's way, then ducked into a side alley with his limp. Orland panicked to catch all five vials. The leech, meanwhile, was still pulling itself back together after that nonstop barrage of attacks. It was an opportunity.

Once he stuffed all five vials under his coat, he picked up a loose tile from the edge of the roof and hurled it at the leech's head. He'd intended to just distract the leech and slow its regeneration even further, but to his surprise, the leech suddenly snapped its head at the tile, caught it, and crushed it with its thousand teeth. Orland gulped. It was intelligent, and it was learning.

"Good day, Your Majesty," he muttered.

"You called for a great slayer?" Then he turned tail and ran once again. Jump, burst, land—but this time, he gulped down his vials whenever he found the time, and he made a conscious effort to not overuse his sylph shoes. He needed all the mana he could restore. The leech charged and tore through the streets behind him as he hopped and skipped across the roofs to the noblequarters, and if it were anyone else, they might've slipped and fallen or lost their nerves at the idea of falling already, but not him.

He'd leaped across chasms far wider than these gaps between buildings while hunting lesnik foxes, and if it was about the fear of falling, well, he'd already done that too. Keep going! he thought, rasping for breath. It's not having an easy time catching up, either! While he was trying to focus on not getting caught, he couldn't help but hear the leech tear through walls and broad avenues and all the luxuries the rich looked down on the slumborn with, either.

It smashed through the fronts of houses too decorated for it to turn cleanly around. It blasted balconies apart. It tore through gardens and high roofs with its head whenever he cut too close over them, and it was all fine with him. Then, three streets over, he spotted Ruslan and his cronies in the corner of his eye. They were all half-stumbling, half-scrambling at the locked side gate of Ruslan's family manor, shoving at each other to get in first. Just seeing them made his teeth grind.

Without breaking stride, he pulled a small one-mana pebble up from the edge of the roof with his gauntlet and flicked it down. The pebble cracked Ruslan cleanly in the side of his head, and the boy yelped and dropped straight onto his ass while the others whirled around in confusion. Serves you right. He didn't stay to enjoy it, though.

He kept going, shoes tapping once, twice, before launching over the next gap between roofs until the largest salt warehouse in town came into full view: a broad-fronted merchant storehouse with reinforced walls, a tall metal gate, and enough salt packed inside that he felt like sneezing even just looking at it. Perfect! He landed on top of the iron gate and whirled. The leech was still charging hard at him. Its skin looked a little raw from the earlier lashes, but the worst of the tears had all closed.

Its mouth pried wide open when it saw him stop, so just in case, he taunted it with a shout.

"You called for a great slayer?" The beast screeched and lunged at him. He waited until the last possible second—until he could see the wet shine in its gullet and the flex of all four limbs driving it forward—before pouring mana into his shoes, jumping up. The leap carried him high enough to clear the beast's head, but the leech couldn't stop its momentum. It slammed straight through the gate, through the front of the warehouse—and the whole building collapsed inwards with a deafening crash.

What came down with it was exactly what he'd been counting on: mountains of loose salt, barrel-stacks rupturing open, and whole white waves of the stuff pouring over the leach from above and around. The leech immediately let out a scream that sounded nothing like its earlier battle cries. This was pain, real, blistering pain, as the salt coated its skin. Wherever it touched, flesh tightened, smoked, cracked and bled dark. Choke on it!

He did a few more quick hops off nearby lanterns, then landed in a roll atop the half-collapsed back section of the warehouse. Directly below him, the leech kept writhing in the salt as it tried to claw its way free. Every movement only made it worse. Salt piled under it, against its wounds, into its mouth. It wasn't easy to tell with all the shifting waves of white, but it was shrinking. Its skin was actually peeling off in strips, while blood was starting to pour off it in clotted dark rivers. But it wasn't dead.

Not yet. If it got out, it'd never chase him anywhere ever again. How much mana do I have? If the newfound bubbling heat in his chest wasn't indication enough, a quick check of his tag confirmed the number: a hundred and seventeen out of a hundred and seventeen. Max capacity. … Thanks, Kazimir. So he planted his feet on the roof and raised his gauntlet. He could do this. He had to do this. The ground beneath the mountains of salt answered his call with a deep groan.

He imagined pillars of stone and pulled them up with his gauntlet, the mental strain translating to physical exertion as three great earth columns ripped free from below the leech. As he lifted them into the air slowly, the leech sank deeper into the pit of salt, buried almost entirely up to its head. Come on, come on, come on… And drop! Once his three twenty-mana earth pillars were suspended even over his head, he let go and allowed gravity to do the rest.

The pillars flew straight down, and with a deafening crack, they punched the leech even deeper into the pit, making it scream so loudly he flinched despite himself. Again! He seized the pillars before they could sink with the leech, lifted them, and drove them down again. The leech screamed again, pummeled by the earth. Again! He heaved the pillars up and rammed them back down. Again! More salt slid down after each strike. More earth collapsed inward.

The leech's body twisted and thrashed less and less each time, and Orland felt his own body doing the same. Every lift and drop drained him harder. Mana burned out of his chest, down his arm, and straight into the gauntlet. He felt if he kept this up any longer, his body might just shrivel up like the leech and fall over. Just… one more! Again! With one final heaving breath, he punched the ground with his gauntlet, and the three earth pillars shattered on impact with the leech.

The beast was driven so deep inside the pit of salt that only a sliver of torn flesh remained visible between the shifting waves—but even the waves, too, stopped shifting once all the moving settled down. No more screeching. No more thrashing. The leech was dead, and he'd even given it a salt burial. He stayed where he was, standing upright with his head spinning and his lungs grasping for every strand of air they could get.

He gasped and panted, clutching his chest—not once in his life had he ever felt this exhausted—but he quickly stopped himself from staggering backwards and falling over when he noticed movement around the noblequarters beneath him. Townsfolk edged closer from every street, guards spread out amongst them. It started off with just a few, but then it became a few dozen, and then it became a few hundred faces looking up at him, still shocked at what'd just happened to their town. Kazimir was there, too.

He stood near the side of the crowd around the salt pit with Milena beside him., and he stared up at Orland with that same, unreadable intensity as ever. But he didn't speak. None of them did. … So Orland forced his breathing steady. He forced his shoulders back. He refused to let himself hunch over like an exhausted slum boy who'd just burned through everything he had and then some, because what sort of Hero would ever let people see that side of him?

He clenched his jaw, forced a smile, and raised his gauntleted fist.

"You called for a great slayer?" he shouted. And for one little beat, the noblequarters stayed quiet. Then the cheers came. rolling through the upper streets and spilling downhill, louder and louder as people took the cue and spread it outward.

'The Hero has done it.'

'The Hero has saved Rusalka.' Guards shouted it. Servants shouted it. Merchants who'd never lifted a hand for anyone in their lives shouted it with tears in their eyes as though they'd been in the fight too. All of their cheers washed over him so hard they almost felt warm, but the truth was, he only had eyes for Kazimir. The disgraced captain didn't have the same for him. Without a word, the man turned and walked away from the crowd. That was the moment something in his head clicked. … It's not over yet.

Baba Marza. He hopped down onto a lower floor, then dropped down floor by floor until he reached the ground. Before anyone could stop him—before anyone could swarm him with praise and questions and hands and noble gratitude—he pushed past all of them and sprinted straight down the noblequarters with strength he didn't know he still had in him. A man could ask any slumborn in Rusalka, and they'd tell him they didn't pray. Orland didn't, either.

He had no goodwill for the gods who handed him a life like his and called it fate, but just this once—as he tore down towards the ravaged middlequarters—he prayed to every god there was that Baba Marza was well. She's still alive. She has to be. Because… the fate of the 'Hero' will protect her, right?