Chapter 172: Two idiots
The butler looked stunned at the speed that the guards were taken down.
"Let go of them," Ren spoke, and they immediately moved away from the guards that were down. He turned and looked at the butler.
"Sorry about the manners of my subordinates, they did not mean to harm your people," he said, a smile on his face.
The butler became tense. He did not know what to do at this moment. He was informed to not allow Ren in easily, and now he was faced with the threat of someone that did not care about the now duke’s name and was acting all on his own.
"Now, who is causing a ruckus here?" A deep male voice came from behind. Ren turned around to see who that was.
Two figures stood there. One was a tall, handsome man with a greatsword on his back. He had on a white jacket over white pants, his black hair was slicked back clean. The lady beside him was in a similar dress, only made to fit her more, but she carried no weapon and simply stood there normally. She had silver hair that matched her eyes as well.
The butler was immediately filled with light the moment he saw the both of them. He knew who they were and what they could do, so he saw his opportunity. He rushed past and bowed before both of them.
"Master Louis and Lady Tera. Thank goodness you are here. Please come and help me speak to the guest here. They are meant to wait a bit before they can see the Duke, but that information did not sit well with them, and as a result, this happened."
"Jeez, you tell a really good fake story, you know?" Ren asked.
"Hey, so you know you need to wait, right? Throwing a tantrum does not mean you’ll get to see the Duke fast," Louis spoke.
"Hey, you, yeah, shut up," Ren said as he pointed right at Louis.
"You have zero idea what’s happening, so please keep quiet."
Louis’s expression shifted the moment the last word left Ren’s mouth.
His hand found his sword.
"You might want to watch your mouth," he said, the words coming out low and controlled in the way that things came out when the person saying them was deciding how angry to let themselves be. His eyes moved across Ren, taking in the horns, the wings, the tail. Something settled in his face. "Demi-human."
Ren raised an eyebrow.
"Demi-human," he repeated. "You cannot even get the name right."
Louis pulled the sword free.
He moved fast, faster than the butler had expected and faster than anyone who had not been watching him carefully would have tracked, crossing the distance between them in a burst that carried the weight of real training behind it, the greatsword already swinging in a wide horizontal arc before he fully arrived, the kind of slash that ended conversations.
The clang that came back at him was not what he expected.
Remu’s sword met the greatsword mid-arc, and the shockwave that came off the contact rolled outward across the entrance hall, rattling the frames on the walls and sending a crack through the stone floor between them. Remu looked at Louis directly, his eyes carrying the particular quality they carried when he had made a decision and everything after that point was simply execution.
He pushed.
Louis went backward, his boots finding the floor and dragging before he caught himself, skidding three meters before he stopped. He looked at Remu with the expression of someone recalibrating.
"So this will be interesting," he said.
He burst forward again.
Beside him, Tera moved her hands.
The ground responded before anyone could fully register what she was doing, stone shifting and rising, golems pulling themselves upright from the courtyard floor in rapid sequence, each one starting at seven feet and settling into something solid and purposeful, turning toward Ren’s group with the slow patience of things that did not need to hurry.
Ezra moved to intercept, and Remu shifted his weight.
"Hold back."
Fey’s voice was quiet and carried no particular urgency, which somehow made it more effective than if she had shouted. She walked forward from behind the group, her smile present and unhurried, her hands coming together as she reached the front, her evil smile still there.
She snapped her fingers.
The formations that burned into existence on the ground around her were green and geometric and moved fast, and from them the liches rose, floating above the stone, staff and components already active, their empty eye sockets oriented toward the golems with the focused attention of things that had been given a target and were already thinking about the most efficient approach.
The first fire spell came from the nearest lich and hit the lead golem square in the chest, the impact cracking the stone exterior and sending fragments scattering across the courtyard. Ice followed from the second, the temperature drop immediate and sharp, fractures spreading across the damaged section of the golem before the third spell hit and the whole thing came apart.
The remaining golems moved toward the liches, and the liches met them with the same efficiency, fire and ice working in alternating patterns, each spell finding the structural weaknesses the last one had opened, the golems coming down one after another with the methodical consistency of something that had been asked to solve a problem and was solving it.
Across the courtyard, Remu and Louis traded exchanges that shook the ground beneath their feet with every contact, Louis pressing with speed and the considerable strength his frame suggested he had, Remu meeting every strike and redirecting it and pressing back, no wound landing on either side but the shape of the fight communicating clearly to anyone watching which direction it was going.
The main door of the manor opened.
The man who stepped through it carried himself in the way that certain people carried themselves, not loudly, not with performance, just with the particular weight of someone who had been making decisions long enough that the habit of authority had settled into the way he moved, the Duke.
He looked at the courtyard. At the golems coming apart. At Remu and Louis. At all of it.
"That is enough," the Duke said.