Chapter 37: Choked, Father, Save Me!

Thud! Thud! Thud!

The surrounding Egyptian warriors began to beat their shields, forming a path in front to guide Aaron toward the platform. Aaron took a deep breath, loosened his limbs, and tentatively stepped forward. He looked nothing like a priest's guard; he looked every bit the novice.

Yet, Urset showed no sign of doubt. He raised his axe, cracked his neck, and twisted his face into a savage snarl.

"State your name!"

"I am Urset! Messenger of Sekhmet! Warrior of Horus!"

Malum frowned and clenched his fists. He liked many things about Egypt, but their penchant for calling the Pharaoh "Horus" always irritated him.

Aaron had already stepped onto the platform. He took a conservative stance—shield in his right hand, sword in his left—and bowed slightly. He rose onto the balls of his feet, ready to dodge to the right at any moment. That was exactly where the trajectory of the enemy’s swing would end. If he rolled correctly, the moment he turned back to strike, he could target the enemy’s hip or leg tendons, severely crippling their mobility.

"Aaron Will. Uh, I don’t have a title."

Urset waited for Aaron to finish before grinning cruelly. He flipped his great axe with one hand and brought it crashing down toward Aaron. His swing was naturally slower than Malum’s. After dodging the fish his father had thrown at him yesterday, Aaron found Urset’s attack sluggish and weak—less impressive than the bouquets thrown by the girls beneath the stage at the Thebes theater.

Aaron leaned forward, pushed off his right shoulder, and used the friction of his shield against the floor to curl and roll rapidly. He sank his waist and arrived in a half-crouched position after the turn. Before he had even stabilized, his left-handed longsword slashed backward.

*Bang!*

Urset’s axe hit the ground first, gouging a crater into the platform. Then, his massive frame stumbled forward a few paces, clutching his lower back. A wound had been carved there by Aaron, though unfortunately, it missed the arteries, so little blood spilled. It failed to damage Urset’s pelvis or thigh muscles, either.

Aaron steeled himself. Recalling the way Jaghatai leaped onto the back of the White Scars’ wild horses, he instinctively sprang into the air, using his longsword like a spike to stab at Urset’s neck. He had considered using his shield to bash the man, but seeing that they were both bald, his force faltered slightly.

The longsword pierced the flesh above Urset’s shoulder blade, then slid off the shoulder as if it were covered in slick hair or smooth scales. This prevented Aaron from stabilizing his body, and he crashed onto Urset’s back. Losing his grip on the sword, he had to improvise; he wrapped his left arm around the man’s throat and quickly tucked his legs in to support his weight. With that buffer, he slammed his shield hard into Urset’s head.

*Clang! Clang! Clang!*

The crisp, rhythmic sounds of impact echoed incessantly as Aaron kept up his assault. Malum watched Aaron’s face with great vigilance. Good, he was simply tired and panting; there was no sign of him getting carried away by the violence.

Confirmed: this thing was a bird in a dog’s skin. He was no follower of Khorne, nor was this any sort of hybrid faith.

Urset, his scalp bleeding from the blows, felt no pain. Instead, he simply toppled backward, pinning Aaron beneath him. Sekhmet had granted him the power of total painlessness. In reality, Bilaini had simply blocked some of Urset’s nerve signals based on the requirements—a feat that was technically the domain of those green-skinned brutes. Or, perhaps, when the little puppies went on a rampage, they too felt no pain; they just lacked the capacity to manage it.

As it happened, one of his own Greater Daemons, desperate to understand the material principles of how Nurgle kept patients from feeling pain, had spent some time researching it, only to produce such a useless psychic spell. For days, the sounds of the Changer of Ways retching had echoed from the depths of the labyrinth. Then, the Master had issued an order forbidding any Greater Daemon from researching Nurgle’s spells. Consequently, he had been ordered to pivot his academic focus, arriving at this time node—where the future was an unknown—to try and find a new approach from the side of Khorne. When a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch got serious about academics, they were just as ruthless in exploiting their underlings.

In reality, Aaron was pinned beneath Urset. He could no longer break free. No matter how well he had performed early on, once he failed to inflict effective damage, the tide had become impossible to turn. He decided to abandon the idea of winning and focus on his initial goal: forcing Urset to unleash the demonic power within him. He cast aside his shield and pulled from his waist the spike Lorgar had gifted him; its shape and size were quite suitable for stabbing.

"Brother, forgive me for using this gift for such things," Aaron murmured, thrusting the spike toward Urset’s eye socket. His body was battered repeatedly, and he had to aim several times before the spike found its mark.

On the spectator stands, the people were stunned into silence; the arena was filled only with Urset’s roars. How, and why, had the situation suddenly shifted like this? They had assumed Aaron would be defenseless before Urset. Dodging a few attacks meant little; Urset, fearless of pain, would eventually hack his head off. Yet, they had not expected the young, bald man's response to be so brilliant—he was the first opponent to ever inflict damage on Urset. But, alas, they had all seen the miracles bestowed upon Urset; once this "Mad Crocodile" was provoked, he would erupt with power far exceeding that of a human.

"Ah! I can't see! I can't see!"

"Sekhmet, I have found your target!"

Urset roared. Sekhmet had told him to come here and kill a man, saying that fate would push him forward as an enemy. This person would threaten Horus and become the Emperor who would rule humanity in the future. He had to be strangled in the cradle! It must be Aaron Will! In myths, this was the standard script for a protagonist who faced a much larger enemy with a calm head. Urset had been quite fond of reading before he became a priest; that was how the stories always went.

But now, the gods were on his side!

Urset sat up abruptly, reached back to seize Aaron by the throat, and hauled him into the air. Aaron only had time to pull the spike out before he was left dangling. *Damn it, does this guy not feel pain?* he thought. *When Odysseus faced the Cyclops, he only needed to deal with one eye!*

Held high by his throat, Aaron lacked the physical prowess of his brother Jaghatai to exert force while suspended. However, other than feeling a bit stifled, he didn't feel like he was suffocating or that his face was turning red.

*Father!*

Aaron struggled to turn his head to look at his father. Dalet was feeding fruit to Anda with a knife and fork, his gaze filled with affection. The latter occasionally lifted her veil to eat, though she never made physical contact with Dalet.

*Great. Can't count on my dear old dad.*

Fortunately, what Aaron had been waiting for happened next. The eye Urset had been stabbed in stopped bleeding. In its place, pale gray scales began to flow out, slowly congealing and knitting the ruined eyeball back together.

This was it—the demonic power was beginning to manifest. Now that it had shown its face, there was no escaping!

On the stands, the knife and fork in Dalet’s hand froze. *Sekhmet granted Urset the authority over disease and healing, too? Then what am I?*

Anda habitually lifted her veil and opened her mouth, waiting for a long time, but no fruit was delivered. *Oh, right. My son has finished his objective, and I haven't eaten enough yet.* She sighed. *I must say, the fruit in Egypt is quite tasty.*

Since the demonic power had manifested, it was time to get to work. Anda casually threw a punch, shattering Dalet’s head, and took the fork from his hand. *Can't waste the food. That sissy, I've tolerated you for far too long.*