Chapter 136: The New King
The giant chieftain's sneer was a seismic event, a rumbling contortion of scarred flesh. Surrender? The concept was as foreign to him as mercy. His tribe followed strength, and the greatest strength had promised them glory, had promised them the warm southern valleys and endless herds. The Dark Lord. Not this… this gnat with its stolen light.
"GIANT… BOW… TO NO ONE!" Korg's voice boomed, shaking ice from the cliffs. "DIE, HUMAN!"
His good hand, the left, shot out with surprising speed for something so vast, fingers like stone pillars closing to crush the insolent speck. Around them, the other giants, emboldened by their chief's defiance, surged forward with hungry roars. Their target was Hagrid, the familiar, the easier prey. The ground trembled under their charge.
"ELIAN!" Hagrid bellowed, fumbling for his pink umbrella. "DO SOMETHIN'!"
Elian did not look at the closing hand. He watched the chief's eyes, saw the triumph there, the absolute certainty of victory. He didn't move to dodge.
He simply raised the Sacred Sword of the Vishanti.
The blade, forged of no metal known to wizard or giant, met the descending palm. There was no clang of steel on stone. There was a clean, silent parting. The mystical energy sheared through calloused skin, thick bone, and colossal tendons as if they were mist.
For a second, Korg didn't understand. He felt a strange absence of pressure. He saw his own hand, severed at the wrist, tumble through the air and thud to the earth, fingers still twitching in a reflexive grab. Then the pain arrived, a white-hot nova of agony that erupted into a scream so raw it silenced the charging giants.
"AAAAAAAAAGH!"
Korg staggered back, clutching the gushing stump to his chest, dark blood cascading down his fur kilt. His tiny eyes, wide with shock and a terror he had never known, locked onto Elian. The human hadn't been crushed. He was untouched, hovering now a few feet off the ground, his cloak billowing as if in a private wind. The golden sword in his hand was unblemished.
"I offered a choice," Elian said, his voice calm amidst the giant's bellows of pain. "You made it."
He ascended until he was level with the giant's pain-contorted face. The smell of blood and fear was overwhelming. "Surrender. Now. Or the next cut takes more than a hand."
Korg's pain ignited a deeper, more primal rage. Surrender? To this? Never! With a roar of pure hatred, he swung his remaining arm, not to grab, but to swipe, using the broken, jagged bones of his wrist as a crude club to smash this flying insect from the sky.
He was fast. But Elian was thought given motion.
The Levitation Cloak pulsed. Elian didn't fly away; he darted inside the arc of the swing, a blur of red and gold. The Vishanti's Sword traced a line of brilliant light through the freezing air.
Korg's roar cut off.
His massive head, its expression frozen in a snarl of fury and sudden, dawning comprehension, tilted sideways. It slid from his shoulders, hit his collarbone with a sickening thunk, and then plummeted. It struck the frozen ground and rolled, coming to rest facing his own headless corpse, which swayed for a moment before crashing down like a felled tower.
The impact shook the valley.
Silence, absolute and profound, swallowed the world.
The giants who had been charging Hagrid skidded to a halt. They stared at their chieftain's body, then at the head. Then at the small figure who landed gracefully upon the giant's broad chest, the glowing sword held loosely at his side.
Elian turned, his gaze sweeping across the frozen ring of monstrous faces. He saw no grief for Korg. He saw fear. He saw confusion. He saw the hollow space where leadership had been, waiting to be filled.
He raised his voice, not shouting, but projecting it with a force that was not physical. "Your chieftain is dead. He chose death over wisdom. He promised you scraps from a snake's table."
He pointed the tip of the glowing sword at the nearest giant, a hulking male who flinched as if burned. "I offer you more. I offer you a place. A purpose. Under a new chieftain of your own blood. Or…"
He let the alternative hang. He didn't need to gesture to the headless bodies littering the clearing. The message was carved in flesh and ice.
One giant, younger and more reckless than the others, overcome by a berserk grief or simple stupidity, let out a challenging bellow and lunged, hefting a boulder.
Elian didn't even turn. A golden disc, smaller and faster than the one that had felled the first giant, shot from his left hand. It passed through the giant's thigh. The leg buckled. The giant fell with a cry, its charge ending in a heap of writhing pain.
Another giant, seeing its companion fall, roared and raised a club.
A second disc. A severed forearm. A howl of agony.
A third took a step. A disc sliced the ground at its feet, carving a smoking line in the permafrost.
Elian stood atop the dead chieftain, a statue of terrible, silent power. He had not moved from his spot. He had barely glanced at his attackers.
"Enough."
The word was a command that brooked no argument. The remaining giants, about eighty of them, froze. The only sounds were the moans of the wounded and the relentless wind.
Hagrid was on his knees, not in prayer, but in sheer, overwhelming shock. He watched Elian, this boy he'd escorted, this student, and saw a stranger. A conqueror. The centaurs' 'Master Mage.' It was one thing to hear about it, to see the aftermath. It was another to watch him dismantle the leadership of a giant colony in three minutes with serene, brutal efficiency.
Elian ignored the moans. He looked out at the cowed, terrified giants. The fear was good. It was the foundation. But fear alone bred eventual rebellion. They needed a focus. A symbol they understood.
He raised his left hand, the Sling Ring on his finger. He focused, not on a location he knew, but on a connection—a bond of blood and magic he had felt in the Forbidden Forest. He drew a circle in the air.
The portal that opened was not to a place, but a scrying window. It showed the Forbidden Forest near Hogwarts, dark and deep. And there, illuminated by a shaft of moonlight, was Grawp. He was sitting, looking confused, holding a large, cracked bell. Beside him, her expression firm despite her fear, was Hermione Granger, speaking to him slowly and clearly.
The giants gasped. They knew Grawp. The runt. The weakling they had driven out.
"Behold," Elian's voice cut through their murmurs. "Grawp. Your blood. He is under my protection. He is learning. He will be your new chieftain. He will lead you to the feasts I have promised. Through him, you will serve me. Through me, you will be strong."
He closed the portal. The image of the runt-turned-chieftain-in-waiting vanished, but the impression remained.
Elian jumped down from the corpse, landing lightly on the bloody ground. He walked towards the centre of the clearing, the giants shuffling back to give him a wide berth. He stopped and drove the point of the Vishanti's Sword into the frozen earth. The golden light pulsed, a beacon in the gloom.
"Kneel," he said.
For a long moment, nothing happened. Then, one by one, starting with the wounded and the most fearful, the giants of the Northern Mountains lowered their colossal bodies. They knelt in the snow and the blood of their former chief, their heads bowed not in grief, but in submission to a power more immediate and terrifying than any they had known.
The Supreme Mage System's notification glowed in Elian's mind: 'Mission 'The Titan's Ire' Complete. Mission 'Mage's Dominion' – First Vassal Race Secured. Rewards: Giant's Might (Passive Strength Enhancement), System Authority Increased.'
Elian Throne stood amidst a forest of kneeling titans, the wind whipping his cloak. He had his army. The first pillar of his new order was cast. And far away, in a headmaster's office and a castle under siege, the storms of his making were just beginning to break.
(End of Chapter)
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