War Priest: Mask of the Fallen (chapter one - read!)

(Here it is, out next month - War Priest is in the same genre as Pilgrim, and I'm going to post the entire book over the next week. This is MY CUT--mind you--and it is at the editor now. It'll be proofed after that. Just an FYI. It'll have mistakes, but it should be pretty smooth as it is my 4th or 5th pass by this point.) 

I'll post it in four chapter increments aside from the first, which is free for all to read. Join my Patreon and read the rest. Come mid-August, this is coming down because it'll be posted on Amazon then!)

.Chapter One.

I will strive to heal regardless of the circumstances.

No matter how broken, I will repair.

These hands do not extinguish life, they prolong it.

I will always remember this.

–Oath taken by disciples of the Academy of Healing Arts written during the Reconstruction period of 801 to 813 by Master Murya Takane in his manual Revivaura: Healing Chi.

Five minutes from now, Arik Dacre would be fighting for his life.

He would swiftly lose that fight against the masked shinobi intruders, his future changing in ways he couldn’t possibly fathom, everyone around him slain in the most barbarous manner imaginable. There would be flames, there would be death, and over a thousand years of carefully curated healing texts and arcane Revivaura treaties would be wiped off the face of Taomoni forever.

By the end of the hour, Arik would be the last classically trained healer alive not only in his nation, but quite possibly his entire world, the only flame still burning, the only ray of hope for a war torn nation.

Against all odds, Arik Dacre would become the War Priest.

****

The disciples of the Academy of Healing Arts were educated in the art of the sword, even if the rest of their lives would be dedicated to mending wounds and caring for the sick. They used wooden swords for the graduation tournament, their teachers learning long ago that the family members in attendance found it hard to stomach bloodshed, even if the disciples were technically able to heal themselves.

Arik Dacre’s only focus amidst a sea of spectators holding various clan banners, including his parents and his younger sister seated somewhere on the third row, was to defeat the opponent standing before him, a youth whom he had grown up with.

He had made it. After several grueling years of study, Arik Dacre had graduated from the Divine Branch of Wound Transfer, and all that was left was the ceremonial tournament, something he had been looking forward to for ages.

The disciple was so focused on his stance that he couldn’t possibly have noticed the sudden appearance of men in dark gray robes behind the spectators, hoods over their heads, black masks hiding their features. It would be something he would regret to no end for the rest of his life. What if he had seen the masked intruders? What if he had been able to warn the spectators? Could he have made a difference? Or were they doomed regardless?

Treating his wooden blade as if it were a longsword, Arik sent it in a downward motion, his opponent able to sidestep his attack.

Crack!

Their wooden blades collided, yet another combat lesson coming to Arik as the two tried to overpower one another. The only way to overcome a scenario in which two swordsmen were equally matched was to let one’s body become what was known as the striking body, and their mind the striking mind, to no longer probe for preliminary hits, to go straight for a strike executed with sheer resolve.

You can do this,Arik thought as he pressed back, taking an upper stance and monitoring his opponent’s cadence. You have to win.

The crowd of spectators seemed to swell around him as he advanced on his opponent. He knew not to give his opponent a name at that moment, even though they’d briefly shared one of the Academy’s dormitories, even though they had graduated at the same time from the Faithful Branch of Common Restoration several years back.

It was better to classify him as an ‘other,’ or better, an ‘obstacle,’ if Arik was going to win this.

If he was able to best his opponent he would progress to the next leg of the tournament, a fitting way to officially signal his entry into the Academy of Healing Arts’ School of Mastery, where Arik would study the Sacred Branch of Chi Healing, one day becoming a priest himself, carrying on the tradition and helping people across the Onyx Realm in any way he could.

But he had to win first, not only for his own self-respect, but for his parents and his sister in attendance, for his favorite Revivaura teacher, Master Guri Yarna, the old man clad in white robes and sitting at the front of the spectators.

You can do this...

Rather than initiate the next attack, Arik decided to strike exactly when his opponent advanced on him, which was a maneuver known as the body-body initiative. In doing so, he would either elicit agitation, or force his opponent into a situation where he would need to recoup.

Crack!

Their wooden blades met again, Arik’s dark eyes narrowing on his opponent as he spun to the right, the disciple feeling the vibrations through the wooden sword as their weapons met again.

Crack!

Arik was so focused on taking his opponent off guard that he was unable to gauge the calamity taking shape all around him as some of the people at the top of the stands were swiftly pulled backwards, their throats slit.

Hoping to trick his opponent by presenting a fake opening, Arik cried out, feigning a downward strike, which forced his peer to block an attack that was destined never to land. With an intensity that had brought him trouble in his past, Arik spun in the opposite direction and brought his wooden blade against his opponent’s neck, which was considered a deathblow.

His opponent now had a name.

As Arik stepped away from a young man named Xander, he lowered his head, trying not to visually celebrate his win, his eyes clenched shut for a moment as he basked in his victory.

Arik had done it. He had advanced to the next round.

And just as he let out a deep, satisfying breath, people started screaming.

As soon as his eyes flashed open Arik was met with an image that would cause him some confusion over the next few days as he tried to piece together what had happened. After that point, it would give him night terrors. After that point, his reason for existence.

In one moment he was victorious, Arik respectfully bowing his head to his opponent, to Xander, eyes closed, the crowd clapping and cheering. In the next, there were killers in dark gray robes and demonic masks maiming indiscriminately, the white and cream colors used by the Academy of Healing Arts suddenly splattered with crimson.

No blades were permitted in the ceremony, which left just a handful of disciples with wooden swords to try to defend their honor. The masked men, these barbarous invaders, descended upon the graduating class and their priestly teachers, many of whom died yelling to their students to protect the innocent. Confusion and violence one in the same.

Xander was quickly cut down by one of the masked men before he could get his wooden blade up, an actual death blow.

Seeing Xander’s bloodsoaked white robes sparked a sudden change in Arik, the act of brutality snapping him out of his momentary shock. Crying out in anger, thus giving away his next strike, Arik attempted to bring down the nearest masked man with his wooden sword.

Had it not been for Master Guri Yarna, Arik’s life may have ended right there.

There would have been no second coming of the War Priest, Arik simply dying at the ceremony with the people he had grown up with, the people who’d raised him, their bodies later turned to ash by a raging fire.

“Run, disciple!”

Master Guri Yarna’s voice reached him just as he was attempting another strike. Rather than see his attack through to its natural conclusion, Arik jumped backward and ended up colliding with another masked trespasser, the two spiraling toward the ground.

My parents. My sister...!

Arik’s own voice in his head had a way of dampening the chaos growing around him. As he scrambled to his feet, his eyes shifted to where his family had been sitting mere moments ago, his mother dead; his father gasping for air, his hands bloodied with his own entrails; Mori Ehara, his sister, nowhere to be seen.

“No!” Arik shouted, his hand naturally coming before him, as if reaching out to his family would have somehow prevented their death.

A blade shot out of nowhere, cleaving through four of his fingers and sparing his thumb, Arik gasping as he pulled his arm back.

There was always pain when it came to a wound like this, the numbing sting, the twist in the stomach, the way that the wound jolted his attention away from his family, the flow of blood. Yet he also recognized the pain instantly, having spent years now mastering the Faithful Branch of Common Restoration, followed by the Devout Branch of Regrowth, and the incredibly difficult Divine Branch of Wound Transfer—Arik had experienced worse through his studies.

Once again, Master Guri Yarna’s voice reached him.

“Arik!” the older man shouted, his long white beard streaked with blood. He was hunched before another of the head priests fervently healing him, his eyes locked on Arik. “Run, Disciple Arik, you must run!”

But Arik wasn’t ready to give up.

The masked marauder who had cut through Arik’s fingers was just about to bring his sword down again when Arik went for his feet. The two slammed into one of the rafters, a recently slain man rolling onto Arik’s aggressor, their skulls cracking together.

One more look at his severed fingers, and from there back to Master Guri Yarna, who seemed seconds away from being killed himself, quickly told Arik what he needed to do.

He would not run. The night would not end in this way. He would stop the intruders no matter what it took.

After staggering to his feet, Arik went for his aggressor’s sword, an actual weapon made of a blackened metal, rather than wood. Breathing heavily, not able to fully grip the longsword with both hands because of the loss of his fingers—which would regrow over time—Arik charged toward Master Guri Yarna.

The adrenaline, the surprise, and fog of war distorted what little Arik knew about battle. Gone was his focus on stance and cadence, replaced by something almost animalistic, a violence inherent in all living things brave enough to choose fight overflight. And it was precisely this loss of his focus which would cause him to ultimately fail.

He reached Master Guri Yarna just as one of the masked killers descended upon him, Arik able to barely block the man’s first strike.

No, it wasn’t a man, it was a woman, evident in her form and the grunt she released as she brought her blade down.

Without both hands on the grip of his weapon, Arik was unable to truly defend himself against the masked woman. He did manage to block her next strike, giving Master Guri Yarna just a split second to crawl out of the way.

His teacher, the priest who had taught Arik for the last several years, surprised him with his next move. Master Guri Yarna slipped his hand around Arik’s arm.

“You must go!” he cried, spit flying from his lips, absolute dread in his eyes.

Another look around the ceremony space and Arik saw that the masked intruders were rallying around the final group of Arik’s peers, slaughtering them with ruthless glee, blood soaking the walls and the floor, the once hallowed space suddenly primitive, depraved.

“Do you hear me? Disciple!” Master Guri Yarna yanked on Arik’s arm again, dragging him closer to an enormous stained glass window that looked out over a great canyon below, a view that Arik had always found peaceful.

“Master!” Arik shouted as the masked female prepared to attack both of them.

Master Guri Yarna pulled Arik close and looked him dead in the eyes, his pupils twitching as the words left his mouth: “You must live.”

And with that he shoved him forward, Arik going straight through the stained glass, where he hit the rocky overhang below and began plummeting downward toward the bottom of the canyon.

Arik tried desperately to get his balance, and nearly succeeded in doing so as he looped his arms around a thick root jutting out of the side of the canyon wall. Tumbling pebbles led to larger stones, one of which struck him on the crown of his head, everything going black.

Arik dropped, the cool night air doing little to dampen his fall as he barreled toward the bottom of the canyon, toward his inevitable demise.

****

Wake up.

(Wake up.)

The voice could have belonged to anyone. It could have been Master Guri Yarna, or his parents, his younger sister, Mori Ehara.

Wake up.

(Wake up.)

Everything came to Arik Dacre in a flash of sound, the cries of agony far away from him now, oblivious insects buzzing, running water, weary animals moving away from where he had landed.

At least most of them...

Arik had punctured a lung before. He had broken nearly every bone in his body, he had purposely suffered internal and external wounds, all things that he could recover from. He had been burnt to near death, he had been poisoned, he had fallen from a great height. Healable. He had been blinded, he had been shot with a dozen barbed arrows, and he had been bludgeoned. Yet he persevered. Stabbed in the stomach, arms and legs severed, choked, starved, deprived of sleep, berated with needles tipped with flameberry—all things that he could heal from. He could even regrow limbs.

But there was one thing that he would never heal from, one thing that would play out in his mind’s eye long after the moment his destiny was forced upon him in the starkest, most violent way imaginable: Arik would never be able to forget what he had just witnessed.

His peers, his teachers, his family. Dead, every last one of them.

He wanted to scream in agony, but Arik was in so much pain from his epic tumble down the side of the canyon, from the abrasions covering his body, his four severed fingers, his knee snapped out of its socket and the high likelihood of internal bleeding, that he merely let out a gasp.

This is it, Arik thought. You won’t survive this.

He managed to shake his head, his neck straining as he did so.

Yes, you will. You must.

(You must…)

Revenge was a concept that the disciple had never really toyed with before, yet it came to him as he lay there in the jagged scree at the bottom of the canyon, Arik bleeding out, his lungs barely able to inflate, a world away from the terror above.

You must.

Arik turned to his side, ignoring the pain.

Ignore the pain.

It had been one of his earliest lessons in utilizing the aspect of chi that he had spent his life cultivating known as Revivaura.

(Ignore the pain.)

The Faithful Branch of Common Restoration was where his disciple journey had started, where they all started. Years upon years worth of lessons, from healing light scrapes to recovering from moderate blood loss; stitching wounds using concentrated Revivaura to repairing fatally damaged cells and preventing long-term scarring, to even growing new bones and limbs.

Not everything was possible, but most things were as long as he kept his head and his heart.

Arik was made for this very situation, and even though it was an appalling scenario that he would have never consciously chosen, he would survive.

You can do this. Remember your training…

Arik had dedicated his life to mastering Revivaura, his motivation early on tethered to his desire to move to the next school, the Devout Branch of Regrowth, and from there to the Divine Branch of Wound Transfer, which he had just graduated from.

(You can do this.)

(You have to do this.)

Sending his good hand forward, still not certain what the echo was in his head, Arik found a clump of weeds, the plant cool to the touch. While it wasn’t ideal, it would do the trick.

Arik grabbed a fistful of the plant, his eyes closed as he pushed some of his injuries forward.

The now shriveled weeds didn’t absorb all the wounds he had sustained in his fall, but they absorbed enough for Arik’ lungs to fill with oxygen, for blood to start flowing to his appendages, for a few of his scrapes to sew themselves back up.

It was enough for him to move.

Wound transfer, at least when utilized in the traditional method, was supposed to go the reverse direction, from the injured to the practitioner, who would then internalize the injury and dispel it instantly or overnight depending on the severity. What Arik had just done was not only remarkable, it was something that most of his peers, and likely a handful of his priestly teachers, would have thought impossible. Only his main instructor, Master Guri Yarna, knew of the uncanny advancements he had made through the Divine Branch of Wound Transfer.

Not only was Arik able to absorb sheer pain in its chi form, he was able to distribute any pain he experienced or absorbed.

“Master Guri Yarna…”

The thought of his teacher, a man whom Arik had studied with for well over a decade, caused a flood of emotion to swell in his chest that eventually exited his lips in the form of a long, painful sigh.

His teacher, His family, his peers, the staff at the Academy of Healing Arts—who had orchestrated such a heinous attack? Who were the men and women in dark gray robes with demonic masks on their faces? Why? Why of all people, would they attack disciples, those tasked with helping others? Why?

Arik’s muscles screamed as he dragged himself over a large rock with a smooth surface on one side. He tumbled forward and landed on his stomach, the wind knocked out of him. He began rubbing his good hand against the ground, searching for anything that was alive, a worm, a blade of grass, anything.

You can do this, find organic life.

(You must do this.)

He sent an arm out and pulled himself onto his stomach, his legs still numb, Arik deducing that it had something to do with his spine, his nervous system.

Water.

There was water in the vicinity; if he could only reach it, Arik would be able to find something that was alive, be it a plant or an animal.

Head toward the sound...

Over the next ten minutes, even as his natural healing ability began to kick into gear, Arik slowly dragged himself toward the water. He would have been able to heal faster had he not been distressed, and had he not fallen so far, but the particular form of chi he used called Revivaura was also tied to his mental health, and what he had just experienced had disrupted it.

Water.

The thought of water reminded Arik just how dry his throat was. He couldn’t remember the last time he had drunk something, Arik busy before the graduation tournament with the ritual and family.

(Water...)

Thirst became a side motivator, Arik using all the strength he could muster to pull himself closer to the stream that had carved the canyon over thousands and thousands of years. He may have drowned had it been a different season, but his epic plummet had coincided with a particularly dry summer, one in which the Academy had been forced to conserve water.

Finally…

He reached something wet, Arik recognizing it as a gathering of mossy stones, the disciple overcome with joy. Pulling himself forward, he traced his fingers through plants that grew along the river bed, and began gathering as many of them as he could in his good hand.

With a deep breath out Arik transferred his wounds to the plants. Each time one of them wilted, he grabbed more.

A sense of elation came over him as his body repaired itself, his breaths more satisfying, his knee snapping back into place, Arik instantly aware that his four severed fingers would take the longest considering the bone had to be reworked. That was fine. He would be able to fix it in the coming day. He would survive this.

But the world around him had other plans.

Arik heard a noise that sent a chill down his spine, a sudden high-pitched bark followed by the flapping of wings.

A pack of hainu.

The yokai—which was the word used for animals and beings that weren’t easily classified with common creatures—were known to run rampant at night. In the time that Arik had been at the Academy, he had never actually seen a hainu, but he had heard them on multiple occasions, the winged, wolf-like creatures howling and snarling at random points over the night, sometimes close enough to his window that it sounded as if they were just a few feet away.

And now they were just a few feet away.

Arik didn’t know how many landed behind him, but he heard a scuffle of feet and the settling of wings as he turned to face his first attacker, his arm going up just as one of the hainu latched onto his arm.

This was yet another thing he had experienced before, the Academy of Healing Arts wanting their disciples to truly understand the various types of pain, to really grasp their subtleties. Arik’s experience being bitten hadn’t been with a canine, but it had been with a rabid cougar, and he would later attest that that pain paled in comparison to the bite he had just experienced, the hainu digging in deeper as the others nipped at him.

Arik’s feet came alive as if they had been lying dormant, waiting specifically for this moment. He began kicking at the yokai, an idea coming to him as the leader of the pack continued to clamp down on his arm, the other hainu beginning to snap their teeth along the periphery of his body.

(Go!)

The alpha hainu was suddenly yelping as Arik transferred his wounds to wolf-like yokai, which caused it to leap backward.

Another hainu tried to take the leader’s place, its sharp teeth sinking into Arik’s arm as it began whipping its head left and right, snarling. It too began yelping in just a matter of seconds, bolting away from Arik. The hainu were by no means stupid, but it did take them several more attempts to realize that they weren’t going to be able to procure as easy of a meal as they had hoped.

Soon, they were all lifting into the air, howling and flapping their wings, the pack returning to their endless search for easy prey.

Arik had survived yet again.

Even if each bite hurt, and it felt like the leader of the pack had nearly broken his radial bone, Arik had transferred enough of his wounds to the hainu to feel even better than he had upon reaching the water.

You can do this. You… you have to do this, he told himself, that inner voice growing stronger.

(You must do this.)

After a few more minutes of scrounging along the banks of the small river, latching onto any underwater plants he could get hold of, Arik was able to stand. Finally. About the time he got his footing, a faint glow in the distance caught his eye.

“Help…” Arik said, realizing yet again how dry his throat had become.

He dropped to his knees before the stream and began lapping up water as if he were one of the hainu that had just recently departed. Once he finished, Arik turned back to the faint glow, completely entranced by it as he wiped the water off his mouth with the sleeve of his robe.

It was now or never. Arik advanced toward the light at his top pace, not fully healed, but finally able to move.

Tunnel vision, his periphery shifting in and out of dark focus, Arik became one with the light, interpreting it as a beacon of hope, a potential the end of this terrible dream. This had to be a dream. But why couldn’t he wake-up?

Trying to keep his balance, Arik continued along the banks of the stream, oblivious to his surroundings. He paid the ultimate price as his foot got caught under a root and he fell forward, cracking his chin on a slab of stone.

The light ceased to exist, but not before something else made its presence known, a hand on Arik’s shoulder.

“Found one!” a raspy voice called out. “He’s bad off, but he’ll do…”