FicWad

Xander, Priest of Rathma A YAHF Crossover of BtVS and Diablo 2

by Jasruv Lundux




Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Naruto, or Diablo 2.










=== begin of Chapter 04 ===




Recap from end of Chapter 02




Xanmortan sighed, as he realized that he had barely finished the grandest of quests and yet here he was starting another in order to protect and redress the Balance. Time to get to work.




=== === === === === === === ===




Xanmortan drew and linked with his preserved Blood Lord's Head and his favorite wand. He could feel the magics within both items boosting his skills even as he evaluated the situation. The lack of human corpses and general good repair of the village buildings indicated that this was a new attack after a long period of peace, so the use of a Fire Golem was out as he didn't want to burn down the village during the attempt to save it. He lacked the enchanted daggers he normally used to form aIron Golem. In fact he didn't want to risk what little equipment he had, so that was out. Without potions, he didn't want to risk using a Blood Golem as a strong demon attacking it could weaken him severely before it was destroyed. That left only a clay golem.




Resolving that, he first summoned his Bone Armor to protect him from attacks and then formed the clay golem next to him. He spent extra time and concentration to make sure that the golem would only attack if he gave it an explicit mental command to do so. As he waited for the mild drain on his mana reserves to be replenished, he tried to analyze the wrongness of the area to determine the effects it would have. He grimaced as he realized that the taint in the area would prevent him from using any but the most recently killed of corpses as sacrifices for summoning his bone crew.




It was a common misconception that Rathma Priests created undead skeletons out of the bones of their dead enemies. What others thought were skeletons were actually weak golems made of bone, but not the bones of their enemies. The bone material came from Trang'Oul, the Dragon Between Life and Death. The Rathman Priests did use the energies within recent corpses to reduce the cost of forming these golems to a mere double tithe of the normal cost, the same energies that were used in the Corpse Explosion spell. The fact that the skeletal bone golems seemed to emerge from the exploding corpse led to that erroneous conclusion but it still amused Xanmortan sometimes that people assumed that a six foot skeleton could somehow be formed from a 4 foot Fallen One. The local taint meant that he was going to have to use five times as much mana to form the golems but what is, is.




When his mana had recovered, he formed his first skeleton, taking extra time and concentration to form a bone club instead of a sword and diverting part of the energies normally used for physical strength to form shields and bolster the golem's resilience. He wanted to minimize the risks to the transformed individuals as he knew he could not watch every skeleton at once. After forming another in the same mold, he left it at that and proceeded down the street with his clay golem guarding the rear and the two skeletons charging forward under his mental commands to break up individual scuffles.




Larger clumps of transformed individuals were broken up by the judicious use of his Terror curse. He occasionally ran across unfamiliar types of real demons and dispatched them using one or two Bone Spirits. He would replace one of his three minions wherever their opponents would score enough lucky hits to critically weaken them. He kept trying to locate the source of the transformation magic but it seemed to be suffused throughout the entire area without any telltale signs that would lead to its source.




Xanmortan continued on like this for several minutes until he noticed the alertness sigil being formed in the sky with Fire Wall spells. As he did so, he felt a powerful presence emerge from the Ethereal realm near him. He turned his attention towards it as it formed into the forms of awoman and man. Xanmortan searched his mind as the two figures seemed familiar to him for some reason and then the memory came forth. The two matched a picture of Athulua and Kethreyes, the head of the Amazonian pantheon and her consort. He gave the two figures arespectful bow.




“Greetings Lady and Lord of Order. Why do you honor me with your presence?” His said with a tone of cool respect. The priests of Rathma wished to remove all non-mortals from meddling with mortal affairs but the Amazonian deities were far more circumspect and limited in their aid to the Amazons than most other deities and were far better than demons in any respect. There was an actual formal truce signed between the leaders of Rathma and the Amazonian pantheon, which is why Amazons were required to seek formal permission from the Queen before they attacked a Priest or they risked being exiled and excommunicated. The reverse was also true and these facts had prevented several potential conflicts between the two peoples in the past.




“We greet you as well, Champion of Sanctuary. We know of your accomplishments in slaying the Demon Lords of Hatred, Terror, and Destruction. We wish to tell you the reasons behind your presence here.” Athulua declared.




“I'm appreciative of Your presence, but I wonder at why you felt the need? One of your Valkyrie would have been more than sufficient.”




“Perhaps, but this Realm is not Sanctuary and Our attention was drawn here as was your Essence.”




Xanmortan ran the word choice of the deity before him through his mind and calmly replied.




“So I didn't survive the shattering of the Master Soulstone. Then how did I come to be here?”




And so began the complicated technical discussion of the events following the shattering of the Master Soulstone back in Sanctuary and the events that had happened tonight on this new world. The deities told of the Dark Power behind the Three Demon Lords who had refused to have its plan to possess the Master Soulstone fail and had rewound time in an attempt for Its agents to succeed. But every time, a mortal hero arose to stop it from succeeding. The flux of time meant that events changed, sometimes allowing the same mortal to defeat the Three but always mortals rose to the challenge and defeated the Dark Power's plan. The Dark Power had discovered that once it had started the looping of time, it had no choice but to continue to do so when Its agents failed. So much of the Dark Power's essence had become entangled in the continuous looping of time, that it had lost the ability to manifest a material presence anywhere.




“Fascinating. So this young man went as a character in this game you described that closely resembled me and so I was pulled out of the tangle of time loops you described to this world. The spell of this chaos mage transformed him into me and, due to the mage's arrogance, he will continue to retain my powers even when the spell ends because my dagger has become an indestructible chaos focus that will maintain alesser version of the spell. One of his friends has gained the skills of Redwisp the Incinerator and another has become a divine representative of your's who has accepted the mission of spreading the fighting arts of the Amazons to this world, in the process redressing an imbalance that has cost thousands of young women their lives in the past. Is this an accurate summation?” Xanmortan questioned.




“Yes.” was the simple answer of Athulua.




Xanmortan was silent for several moments as he weighed everything before responding.




“Can you put me in touch with the young man's mind? I need to know if he can and will bear the weight of the burden you are proposing to place on him.”




At the duo's nod, he closed his eyes as the power of the deities brushed against his mind bringing it into contact with the suppressed mind of the body's true resident. For a second that seemed to last a lifetime, Xanmortan experienced the life of Xander Harris and felt the depths and nature of his soul.




Opening his eyes he stated.




“He is more than able and willing. Such vast hidden potential within him, allowed to go fallow in this world. I wish I could see what he develops with the teachings. I think that he will become one of the greatest priests of Rathma ever.”




“That can be arranged.” offered Athulua.




“How?”




“We can eject the Animal Spirit that still abides within him and allow your soul to rest in its place. You would be unable to communicate with him but it would grant you freedom from the Tangle surrounding Sanctuary.”




“And my influence would reduce Xander's chance of becoming corrupted, yes?”




“That would be one benefit. Another would be that the mental strain of suppressing the Hyena would be removed from him, allowing his mind to grow more quickly. You would be a far less troublesome resident than the one currently there.”




“Agreed. How will they be able to gain the supplies and equipment they and any future allies will need?”




“Xander is linked to the dagger and it is the key. Even We can't discover all the secrets that it holds as a chaos focus. But we have left some gifts within the backpack you wear. The gifts should allow the mortals to become self-sufficient with enough effort on their part. Now, you should respond to the sorceress's sigil before she exhausts herself. Rest well from your labors after this last task is done, Xanmortan of Rathma.” Saying that the two deities faded away.




Xanmortan faced the burning sigil floating in the sky and used a Bone Spear to pierce one of the Fire Walls. He watched as the Fire Walls went out in sequence and then a plume of flame reached for the sky. Chuckling to himself as he decided to make an entrance, he had his clay golem lift him to one shoulder and carry him towards Xander's friends. Most considered the Priests of Rathma to be dour and grim and there was some truth to that, but amongst themselves they had humor and jokes, albeit they typically relied on an in-depth knowledge of the intricacies of Life and Death. Much like his soon to be host, Xanmortan was considered to be quite humorous and witty, at least by other Rathman Priests.




Xanmortan continued to break up fights between transformed individuals with Terror curses and his two skeleton beaters as he was carried by his clay golem towards the plume of fire. He came across something that resembled a Wendigo chasing a young woman dressed in the tatters of a costume. Determining that the thing was a real demon and not one of the transformed, Xanmortan trapped the beast within a Bone Cage and then used a Teeth spell to send a dozen magical bone missiles through the gaps in the cage to end the demon's existence. When the woman, who Xanmortan identified as Cordelia from what few details he could recall of his host's memories, began to scream at his appearance and start to run away, he used a Weaken curse which caused her to stumble and fall in her exhausted state. He had his clay golem carefully pick her up and place her on its other shoulder.




“I would suggest you keep quiet and recover from your ordeal, miss. Or you might risk twisting an ankle if you fall from your current perch. I won't pick you up again and I doubt you'd survive the night alone.” He calmly stated to her.




He watched in approval as she recovered her breath and a fire appeared in her eyes. He cut her off before she could speak.




“I meant it when I said be quiet. Controlling my minions requires a certain of amount of concentration which a woman's screeching could disrupt, perhaps causing someone to fall off of my golem's shoulder onto the paving stones below.” He said that in a cold, almost clinical tone even as he felt laughter bubbling up inside. Winding her up was just as much fun as Xander's memories made it seem.




Cordelia kept her mouth closed as the implied threat registered. She looked down to the ground and then back at him with a glare before settling back and regaining her depleted wind. He studied her with his magical senses during the brief time it took to reach the meeting point and made an interesting observation. Cordelia had all the markings to be one of the Viz-Jaq-taar, the order of Assassins that were trained to find and kill corrupted mages. He wondered how many of Xander's other classmates had such hidden potentials. He could already sense the raw power of Redwisp/Willow ahead as her mana continued to build even while using the constant drain of the Inferno spell.




'Ah, well. That will be for Xander and his friends to discover and worry about. At least my retirement won't be boring.' Xanmortan thought to himself as he caught sight of the sorceress ahead. A short distance away, a young brunette woman in a confining fancy ball gown was punching away a transformed child and getting respectable distance. Guarding her back was a Valkyrie with black skin, but the spirit seemed to be connected to this realm rather than his home realm from what his senses told him. He delved deeper into the nature of the magics connected to the Valkyrie and stumbled upon thousands of souls trapped in a void between Life and Death, trapped outside of the Great Cycle.




A terrible fury began to build within him as he rapidly traced the spells involved and recognized the nature of the spell. It was a type of soul binding spell used to coordinate mass sacrifices for major demonic summonings, one of the things that Rathman Priests had opposed for centuries on Sanctuary. The spells were often used by cultists to defer the power of the sacrifices over a period of time, allowing them to focus the power of many sacrifices into a single act. He had never read of any as complicated and intricate as this spell nor any as positively ancient as it felt.




Spells like this were usually bound to a physical focus, typically a weapon or other killing implement. The weapon was normally used to perform the sacrifices until the trigger point was reached, but not in this case. However, if whatever the focus was for the Slayer spell was used to kill an active Slayer, the whole spell would trigger. Xanmortan tried to trace the spells to get some idea of the nature of the focus or its location, but the link the spell had to the active Slayer and Buffy prevented it. That link is what provided them their powers. He could sense how the spell practically seethed with the power of those thousands of captured souls beneath what remained of a set of cloaking spells.




He traced the breach in the cloaking spells to the currently brunette woman in the fancy dress, and the memory of Xander breathing life into her surfaced briefly. That action must of somehow freed Buffy from the spell just as the Valkyrie had been freed when she had been Called. Now he knew why the Amazonian Deities had intervened as they had. As Buffy trained potential Slayers to be Amazons, they would learn to call Valkyries from those trapped souls, freeing them and depriving the spell of their energies. With the Slayers living much longer lives with Amazon support and the Amazons freeing the trapped souls as Valkyries, the spell would eventually be weakened to the point where it could be broken without causing massive havoc from the sudden release of the titanic energies already present within it.




But Xanmortan saw aproblem as the souls of the Valkyries would be drawn back into the spell as they had nowhere else to go when the calling spell ended. He knew then what he needed to do. So much for retirement.




He slid from the golem's shoulder and walked to where Redwisp stood as she ceased using her Inferno spell. He spoke in a grim, urgent voice.




“I need your help to fix something immediately. Will you form a blood link with me to share our mana?” he asked.




“What? Oh, but Why?” Willow stammered.




“I call upon your aid as per the Accords between the Zann Esu Mage Clan and the Priests of Rathma. Time is of the essence! Will you give me your aid?”




Willow thought quickly for a moment as the memories of Redwisp came forth, showing her how important it must be for the soul possessing her Xander to call upon the Accords. She decided quickly.




“Then I will assist you.”




Willow didn't notice as she slipped into High Vizjerei, the equivalent of the common tongue for the magi of Sanctuary. She proffered her palm to the necromancer in front of her. He drew his wavy dagger and cut first his own palm and then hers before placing his bleeding palm on top of hers. She could feel the connection form between their two mana wells as he closed his eyes and began his spell casting.




Only then did she notice Buffy and Nikki closing with them with Buffy shouting something. She also noticed Cordelia in a tattered cat costume fuming on the shoulder of a large clay golem and idly wondered why she hadn't transformed into a cat. She noticed Buffy about to grab Xander and used her free hand to gently pick her up with Telekinesis.




“Buffy, don't interfere! It could kill one or both of us if you do.”




Willow took a deep breath as she started to feel the drain from Xanmortan's casting really start to dig into her mana reserves.




“Just keep us safe while he takes care of whatever it is he needs to take care of. Please Buffy?”




Buffy looked doubtfully at her two friends. Xander looked intimidating with all of his gear turned into actual metal and bone and the warning from Athulua ran through her mind about how it wasn't actually Xander in charge. But the mention of the Accords between the necromancers and sorceresses brought up the knowledge of a similar pact between the Amazon deities and the necromancers. Such things were not called upon lightly and if this Xanmortan character felt something was so dire that he needed to take care of it as soon as possible, then she wouldn't interfere for the moment. She was soon distracted by the unfortunately familiar tones of a pissed off Cordelia Chase.




“Buffy Summers, help me down from this filthy thing!” Cordelia demanded.




Buffy took in Cordelia for a moment. The rich teen cheerleader was wearing the tattered remains of what looked like a slutty cat costume. She also had scratches and bruises just starting to turn visible on her exposed skin, at least where she wasn't smeared with a mix of dark brown and red clay from the massive thing whose shoulder she was currently perched on ten or twelve feet above the ground. Buffy was frankly baffled by what Cordelia thought Buffy could do to help her even if she wasn't trapped in this constricting dress.




“Well look at what the cat dragged in?” Buffy couldn't resist using the line, since Xander wasn't able to at the moment. She felt Nikki send her a sense of vigilance as the Valkyrie moved out to intercept some more roving demon kids that were drawing close.




“Ha, Ha. Very funny, Summers. Now help me get down without breaking something would you.” Cordelia replied to the dig, being way too tired to muster up a properly cutting remark. She had been running flat out for what had felt like hours trying to get away from that beast and even though her breathing had evened out, she was still exhausted.




Buffy thought hard for a moment before answering.




“It's better that you stay up there. You're out of the reach of most of the dangers way up there and you're plainly exhausted. If we have to run for some reason, I doubt you could keep up just yet. Besides, you're already dirty so staying up there won't make things much worse. When we get to the library, we can use the first aid kit to clean and tend those scratches.”




“You think I'm going to trust that bone headed freak?” Cordelia's voice and expression clearly showed her disbelief.




Buffy was bemused as she realized that Cordelia hadn't recognized Xander, although to be fair the armor and skull mask did obscure both his body shape and voice.




“If he had wanted you dead, he had so many ways to do it before now. Was he killing anybody on the way over here?”




“Well, he trapped Jojo the dog faced boy in a freaking cage made out of bones before he killed it with some kind of white streaks. But Jojo turned to slime afterwards so he was probably a real demon. Other than that he either just waved that skull-on-a-stick he has at them and they ran away or he'd send the two poster boys for anorexia to break up any of them that were fighting.” Cordelia's expression had turned thoughtful as she spoke.







=== === ===







In the meantime, Willow had been splitting her concentration between trying to increase her mana's replenishment rate and following what Xanmortan was doing. Her magical senses could trace the outlines of what he was doing, but it lay outside of the elemental manipulations that she knew through Redwisp's memories. She caught familiar pieces and bits being folded into the magical structure that he was creating, but it was like trying to understand Russian. Even if the English alphabet was used instead of Cyrillic, the familiar letters were being used in completely different ways than she was used to.




The pace of his spell casting slowed down when her own mana well was almost empty to match how his had gotten shortly after they started. She could follow the broad strokes of what he was working on even if she had no idea what it would do. She also had to keep her attention from wandering as she realized that although she had been using Redwisp's skills, she hadn't actually assimilated her knowledge. She drew her mind back to what was going on as she sensed him completing his casting.




The result of his casting hung above their heads, visible only to her more esoteric mage senses. The closest that Willow could come to describe it was a kind of clockwork egg. It continued to alter and change even though he had stopped casting, the interwoven spells appeared to be self-sustaining now.




“Take care young sorceress and beware the perils of the path you have chosen.” Xanmortan's words startled her from her contemplation of the magical construct he had fashioned with her help. She felt him sever the bond between their mana wells with a deft twist. She then saw his eyes change under the mask for a moment before her awareness was jerked to a metaphysical place she had never conceived of before.




The place existed with no visual cues at all, neither light, blackness, nor color of any sort. But she could sense the pure concepts between which she and Xanmortan stood. The Concepts of Life and Death. Xanmortan was before her and beyond him was the Dragon. Vast was the Dragon, so vast that it wouldn't surprise her that a star going supernova in its eye would be like a dust mote in hers.




She suddenly had a brief visual impression of a old but robust man in dark robes stepping out of the armored form of Xander and pushing Xander into her as her awareness was returned to the world of matter and flesh.




Willow caught Xander's form as he slumped forward while her mind tried to process the sheer stark nature of the concepts she had just experienced. She had always thought the Rathma Priests' claims of the Balance between Life and Death to be simply a belief, the Great Cycle they preached about just a rationale to hide the magical secrets they used for their powers. She somehow knew now that she was holding Xander and that the spirit and soul of his character had somehow taken the magic construct he had made with her help to Trang'oul, the Dragon Between Life and Death, leaving Xander's body and soul behind.




Willow shook her head as she separated her self from the memories of Redwisp. She needed to worry about the unconscious Xander she was holding in the here and now, later she could majorly freak out about issues with existentialism and sorting her newfound memories which were not as integrated with her as she had thought. Willow found herself beginning to collapse under the weight of all the gear Xander was wearing and called out to her super strong friend.




“A little help Buffy!”




Buffy broke off from arguing with Cordelia and and sped over to help Willow. She helped Willow to lay Xander down on the street and held the skull faced helm that Willow took off of him so she could check on his status. It suddenly struck her how real all this craziness actually was as she handled something that had been thin, cheap plastic just hours before and now was made of some kind of extremely hard bone with metal fittings. Her fingertips tingled with the magic that was in the helm as she ran them over the stone runes that seemed to be melded with the helm at various points.




She was pulled out of her introspection as Willow gave out a happy sigh that would have told Buffy that Xander was alright if unconscious even if Willow hadn't started babbling in her relief right afterwards. But Buffy couldn't concentrate on deciphering her babble as a sudden surge of anger came from Nikki. Buffy placed the helm on Xander's chest before she got up and made her way over to where Nikki was barely restraining herself from charging down the street.




Buffy saw a major mob of transformed kids and adults coming down the street. The mob was liberally sprinkled with actual vampires and demons and was led by a familiar bleached blond master vampire. She could literally feel the fury seething within Nikki and remembered the flash she had gotten from Nikki when she was called earlier. She suddenly got the impression of Athulua's smile pass across her mind and an idea of how to deal some long overdue justice came with it.




“Willow, we're going to need some help over here.”




Willow caught the sense of urgency in Buffy's voice and reluctantly left Xander's side to see what new problem the Hellmouth has decided spring forth tonight. She took in the situation at a glance, the experience of many battles as Redwisp in mind as she evaluated the situation.




“Not a lot I can do without killing most of the innocent people out there Buffy.” Willow stated with a tense yet calm tone.




Buffy acknowledged that with a nod.




“I know. The plan is you use some Fire Walls to guard our backs and sides while Nikki and I cover the front. If you can snipe the real demons supporting Spike in controlling the mob between keeping up the Walls, I have a rude surprise for him.”




Willow looked around and calculated the area's dimensions quickly.




“How wide do you want the gap in front?”




“At least 10, maybe 15 feet.”




“Doable, give me the word when you want me to start. Stall him if you can so I can recover more mana. I'll be back by Xander and Cordelia, guarding your backs and providing covering fire.”




Willow walked back to where Cordelia was complaining from the shoulder of Xander's golem.




“I can't believe that Doofus had the nerve to threaten me like that. I going to make him miserable for that, no one gets ME dirty like this and gets away with it.”




Willow would have normally been intimidated by the venom in the cheerleader's voice but not this night. Not with the memories, borrowed or not, of a 25 year old sorceress who had faced down and defeated the justly named Lord of Terror, Diablo. She leveled an intense glare on Cordelia and brought up her free hand as electricity began to arc from finger to finger.




“Unless you'd like to have a bride of Frankenstein hairdo for the next month, you had better shut your mouth unless you have something constructive to add Cordelia.” Willow spoke with deliberate menace. Then the electrical arcs on her hand turned into wisps of bright flame.




“Or I could just burn off all your hair and leave you bald instead. This has been a really bad night and we have a major fight coming up and we don't need the distractions. Understand?”




Cordelia looked at the formally shy nerd girl that she had been intimidating since kindergarten and realized that yes, Willow's pupils had actually turned to dark purple flames. Cordelia decided that any revenge she would take could wait until after the night's craziness was over and meek Willow returned as she had apparently been affected tonight as well. Cordelia's priorities might be skewed from what most people would call normal, but she was smart enough to recognize when not to antagonize someone who was obviously capable dealing her severe harm. Cordelia simply shook her head in acceptance.




Willow snorted as she turned to tend to Xander. She noticed that he was lying in an uncomfortable position with something under his back and managed to remove the object which turned out to be the backpack he had pulled the gifts out of earlier. She opened it up and found a spearhead starting to emerge. She pulled it out and found it to be as tall as Xander. She looked in the pack and found two boxes and nothing else but her attention was drawn to the unpleasant tingle the spear was giving to her hand. Her Redwisp memories identified the tingle as the same she had felt from weapons enchanted for the use of Amazon hands alone.




“Buffy! Catch!”




Willow called out as she used her Telekinesis to carry the spear over to Buffy. Buffy reached and plucked the spear out of the air. She felt a rush of familiarity come into her mind as she recognized the spear as hers.




“Seeker.” Buffy whispered the weapon's name before turning to deal with the Billy Idol wannabe and his mob.




“Ohhh, such abig, pointy stick you got there Slayer. Guess Dru was wrong about you not being the Slayer tonight. Pity that. Was looking forward to tasting Slayer blood with a lot of fear in it. The blood of other two Slayers I had was the best I've ever tasted, but it didn't have the sheer terror in it that I was looking forward to tonight. Ah well, I'll just settle for getting the triple crown tonight.”




“You just love to hear yourself talk, don't you Willie boy? Now Willow!” Buffy cried out the last.




Spike was visibly shocked when walls of fire began springing up around the Slayer and the strange glowing chick that was standing by her side. Before he could order his mob to attack, the walls had formed a nearly closed triangle in front of him with the Slayer blocking the open gap. He could feel the heat from those walls from where he stood near the back of the mob. He snarled out his orders to attack as he waited for his little followers to wear down the Slayer and trip any more surprises she had up her sleeve.




He watched as she flung out the hand not holding the spear and the glowing chick disappeared. Some instinct made him frantically duck to the side as two glowing spears pierced the air where his chest had been instants before. Spike rolled away and came up facing the new threats and was almost impaled again as he made out the features of the two glowing women who had appeared behind him. Both Slayers he had killed before had somehow been returned to life and from the expressions on their faces they wanted to do unto him as he had done unto them.




In the following exchange of blows, only the fact that some of the mini-monsters were attacking and interfering kept Spike from being dusted from either adecapitating swipe from the spear blades or being impaled through his undead heart. The glancing wounds he had received were stinging and burning like cross wounds. Being dead hadn't slowed the two down any and they seemed even stronger than when he had first killed them. They also had new moves that they definitely hadn't shown the first time around.




Spike was torn between trying to run or stay within the mob. This wasn't a battle he could win here in the middle of a street, the two were supporting each other too much. On the other hand, he wasn't sure he could outrun them long enough to find a better battleground and if he did run, he would lose the support of the mini-monsters.




William the Bloody never got a chance to decide as a sudden magical push made him stumble right into the impaling strike of the Chinese Slayer as the Black Slayer swung her spear and decapitated him. As he turned to dust, Nikki Wood met the eyes of Xin Rong and both shared a sense of closure with each other before the sense of building anger and desperation coming from the woman who had Called them out of the void drew them back into the battle. Working as a unit, they made their way back to Buffy, taking care to only knock out the innocents, reserving their lethal strikes for the real vampires and demons scattered throughout the mob.




While they had been dealing with Spike, Buffy had been forced back several feet primarily because she was avoiding killing strikes on the mini-monsters and the occasional transformed adults. Only Willow's liberal use of Telekinesis to push back groups of the mini-monsters as well as the chain lightning spell that Buffy's spear occasionally emitted when it struck had been keeping them back. When the two Valkyrie had bashed their way through the mob to fight on either side of Buffy, the three warriors were able to hold the line. No longer needing to help Buffy, Willow turned her attentions towards the real demons that were continuing to push the transformed kids and adults forwards despite Spike's death. She focused as much of her concentration as she could on targeting them and cast her Thunderstorm spell.




The sudden storm clouds overhead caused the attacking mob to hesitate briefly before resuming the assault. The first lightning stoke that came down and blew up a demon in an explosion of purple gore stopped the mob cold and the one that followed a few seconds later, frying another real demon, caused the mob to break up as the majority of the transformed ran away. Every real demon that tried to reform the mob was struck down and in short order the attack was over. Willow dismissed the spell and breathed deeply as she relaxed her concentration. Controlling which of the targets wouldn't be hit wasn't a problem when you only had a handful on your side. Trying to keep any of the transformed from being hit when they had been the majority of the potential targets had been nearly impossible. If the kids hadn't been so much shorter than the regular demons, she couldn't have done it. As it was, some of the transformed adults had almost been hit.




Willow maintained acareful watch as Buffy and her two Valkyries finished subduing the remaining transformed that were too aggressive to be scared off. She felt a headache begin as the strain of exerting such fine control over the Thunderstorm started to affect her. She didn't see any threats remaining and let the Fire Walls fade away and then watched as Buffy and the two Valkyrie faced each other and then extended their spears out and up until the spear points met. Then the Oriental looking Valkyrie faded away as Buffy and Nikki lowered their spears and came over to where Willow stood guard over Xander's unconscious form.




“Why did the other Valkyrie leave Buffy?” Willow asked.




“She only showed up because of special circumstances, Will. She was the first slayer that Spike killed back in China. Her name was Xin Rong and her last words were to tell her mother that she was sorry.” Buffy sounded sad and almost resigned.




“How. . . ?”




“When I Call them here, I get a sudden flash of their last moments before they died. When she left, I got a sense of pleasant surprise. I'm not sure what that's about and we have too much to do tonight to deal with it now.”




Buffy shook herself briefly and continued in a forced brighter tone.




“How is Xander and what did you say to Cordy to keep her quiet? I expected her screeching to drown out the growls of the mob.”




“My best guess about Xander is that he is in some kind of psychic shock. His costume's character went someplace that I don't think there are any words to really describe and then separated from him. He should be fine from what I can tell but I don't know when he'll wake up.”




Buffy waited for amoment for Willow to continue and then said.




“That's good. And what did you say to Miss Kitty up there?”




“Oh, I told her to keep quiet unless she had something constructive to add or I'd burn off all her hair or give her the Bride of Frankenstein look.” Willow tossed that off with an irritated wave of her hand.




“Can you pick up Xander so we can get to Giles at the library? Even my new magical knowledge doesn't have anything on what ever caused all this, so Giles is our best bet to figure out how to stop it. And I so need some aspirin from the apothecary. I mean from the first aid kit.” Willow rubbed her temple as she closed her eyes.




“What's wrong Willow?”




“The strain from keeping the Thunderstorm spell affecting only the real demons is giving me a headache. I'll be fine but it is making it harder to concentrate. I should probably leave the fighting to you and Nikki there or I might kill somebody. It's a lot harder to not kill with these spells.”




“I know. I've got all these new fighting skills and I couldn't use most of them because they are all so lethal. They'll be great on patrol, but with all these kids in the way. . .” Buffy trailed off.




The two young women stood thinking for a few seconds before Buffy shook herself again and then bent down to pick up Xander. The group then moved out towards the high school with the glowing form of Nikki Wood scouting forward and Xander's minions following behind with a fuming but silent Cordelia still on the Golem's shoulder.







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=== end of Chapter 04 ===