Inquisitor's Promise (Act Two, Chapter Seventeen)

Aeneas has to keep his promises. His father's mission will be completed. And while he's at it, he will become Galatea's lord and Inquisitor. But love and politics are an explosive combination.

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Chapter Seventeen: Nineveh the Swarm King

Aeneas saw the imposing swarm creature in front of him. This was the avatar for Nineveh who himself was located very further down in the Earth’s interior.

“Caius, I am not happy with what you have done,” Nineveh said with a booming voice. “I will not lend my swarm to the traitorous first branch and their accursed progeny!”

“With respect,” Aeneas spoke up. “It had been two hundred years since the days of Patriarch Ulysses.”

“And the passage of time excuses your betrayal?” Nineveh barked. “Do you not know how this Duchy was founded to begin with?”

“I do.” Aeneas replied. “The exile of Patriarch Ulysses remains to be a black eye in the history of House Aquilanus. I wish to move beyond that.”

“That is easy for you to say,” Nineveh growled. “I remember the union of Caius and Simona, long ago. How a whole new race was founded. The history that your people are ashamed of!”

Aeneas did not know what to say, Nineveh was absolutely correct. Thankfully, Lavinia came to his rescue.

“You need to let go of your grudge, Lord Nineveh!” she pleaded.

“Ignorant girl,” Nineveh snarled. “You know nothing!”

“I know that you’re a fifth generation Nineveh. As the successor of Nineveh, you inherited the memories of all the previous Swarm Kings,” Lavinia explained.

“Exactly, you do not fully understand the pains of our ancestors,” Nineveh said. “Furthermore, you are blinded by the feelings you nurtured for your Inquisitor.”

“You are right, I know little of such pains,” Lavinia conceded. “But that’s my advantage.”

“Oh, your ignorance is an advantage?” Nineveh asked with snark. “That is certainly interesting.”

“What I meant to say is that your memories left you embittered,” Lavinia said. “You remembered the good times before the days of Patriarch Ulysses, and now you look at the present day with disdain. You must let go!”

This declaration by Lavinia was met by thunderous laughter from the Swarm King.

“You have spirit, Lavinia,” Nineveh said. “I would be quite honored should you be my Queen.”

Lavinia was taken aback by the Swarm King’s proposal. “What?”

“I am well aware of your infatuation,” Nineveh said. “Let us make a deal here: if you fail to win over your Inquisitor, you will agree to become my Queen.”

To her credit, the deep one girl had quickly regained the composure lost by the Swarm King’s sudden proposal. “And in return, you will help Aeneas, right?” she asked.

“Only if you and your Inquisitor can defeat me in a pitched battle,” Nineveh answered.

Lavinia nodded. “I accept your challenge.”

“Wait, my dear,” Duke Caius interjected. “Please rethink this. You know full well what happens to a woman who becomes the Swarm Queen.”

“What will happen to her?” Aeneas demanded.

“Being the Swarm Queen meant the joining of your body to the Swarm of Nineveh,” Lavinia explained. “A great honor, but also sad. Things will never be the same again. I could never see you or touch you the way I can usually do before. It can only be done through a swarm avatar.”

Aeneas was flabbergasted. To think that Lavinia would simply be putting all of her hopes in this.

Lavinia gave Aeneas a serious look. “I’m going all in, Aeneas.”

Aeneas nodded. He briefly considered to tell her the obvious but decided against it.

Just keep it simple.

“Thank you, Lavinia.”

And thus, Aeneas prepared himself for battle together with Lavinia.

The good news was that given the location, Lavinia was able to call upon a larger contingent of swarmlings. Their larger numbers would no doubt be a great help for Aeneas in the future.

The bad news was that Aeneas was completely out of his depth. Thus far, he had been fighting on land. But now he had to fight underwater.

The Inquisitor was given a pressure suit to make sure that he was not crushed by the deep-sea pressure. Not to mention being able to breathe. The weapon given to him was a harpoon gun. Aeneas was versatile with his weapon of choice, but this was honestly a stretch.

Other than Lavinia and her swarm, the only thing that he had going for him was the Leviathan’s man o’ wars; they were series of jellyfish polyp creatures who had acted as their defense mechanism. It was a good thing that Aeneas had enlisted the help of the seafaring nomads before he went to Pacifica.

The battlefield was a large empty seafloor right outside of Caius Palace. Aeneas knew that very little of the surface light actually reached down to this level. It was only the artificial lights of Simona R’leh that had allowed him to see his surroundings.

On the Inquisitor’s sides were numerous swarm creatures. They were an assorted collection of aquatic life made to fight under the sea rather than on land; more truly fish-like creatures rather than the walking insectoid beings that Aeneas was used to seeing.

On the other side were much of the same, but scarier. Terrifying aquatic creatures that made Aeneas glad that he had fought his battles on the surface thus far. But the most terrifying at all was the large monster. A giant creature with two large hands and a tail at the back. Not too different from Lavinia’s aquatic form, but bigger and less beautiful. No doubt this was Nineveh’s battle avatar. Aeneas knew that if his side were to win, that creature had to go down.

Aeneas opted to stay at the back while Lavinia and her swarm were in front.

Lavinia made the first move as her swarm creatures launched a series of needles at Nineveh’s swarm. The battle had begun.

Swarm creatures charged into one another. One giant fish bit off the head of a smaller one, only to be swallowed whole by a bigger one. Needles were flying around everywhere.

Lavinia attempted to send her swarm creatures at Nineveh’s avatar but were stopped by another swarm of fish-like creatures.

Aeneas was horrified by the battle raging above him. There was blood everywhere that he could barely see the battle unfolding before him.

The Inquisitor knew that part of this was the underwater setting, the blood just went everywhere like smoke in the air. But he also knew that there was an aspect of brutality in a battle between swarm creatures.

It was clear that prior to this, Lavinia had restrained herself. Her attacks against her human enemies had always been as incisive as the circumstances would allow. But when humans were no longer part of the equation, no such restraint was necessary.

In an attempt to make himself useful, Aeneas moved to the epicenter of the battle. A swarm creature made a move for Aeneas, but his man o’ wars were up to the task as they swarmed the creature and stung it to death.

“Vinia,” Aeneas said to his nav-comm which he made sure to have when putting on his pressure suit. “We need to go for Nineveh’s avatar, I need you to cover me.”

“Cover you?” Lavinia asked incredulously. “Aeneas, don’t you see that Nineveh was trying to humiliate you?”

“Go on.”

Lavinia sighed. She knew full well that Aeneas always demanded her to explain her reasoning, but this was not the best time. Especially with a swarm fish lunging towards her.

The deep one girl dodged to her left and sliced the fish with her knife. The fish bled and was mobbed by other swarm creatures.

 Lavinia then turned her attention back to Aeneas.

“If Nineveh simply wants to test my strength or resolve he would not have brought you to fight for me,” Lavinia explained. “Instead, he put you in a situation where you wouldn’t be able to do much. In addition to humiliating you, he wants to show me that you’d only be holding me back.”

Aeneas resisted the urge to point out that Nineveh might be correct. In more ways than one.

“I figured as much,” Aeneas said. “But we’ll prove him wrong.”

“But how are we going to do that?” Lavinia asked.

“If I can land a good hit with my harpoon at him, perhaps in the eyes,” Aeneas began. “Then that would leave his avatar vulnerable to being overwhelmed by your swarm.”

“And you need me to keep him distracted,” Lavinia stated.

“Yes. His attention’s on you. He’ll never see me coming.”

“Okay.” Lavinia nodded. “I trust you, Aeneas.”

And thus, Lavinia intensified her attacks on Nineveh’s avatar. Once more, the sea monster was able to rebuff the smaller swarm creatures. But Lavinia was not deterred, she continued to send these creatures at Nineveh.

Meanwhile, Aeneas steadily walked through the seafloor in his pressure suit. He knew that Nineveh did not see him as a threat at all, so he confidently strolled forward. Though Aeneas was not a deep one, he knew enough of how the swarm function. A swarm commander possessed a mental control over his or her swarm creatures, but not exclusively. For the most part, swarm creatures acted autonomously unless explicitly commanded to by their commanders. As long as Nineveh’s attention was focused on Lavinia, he would not know where Aeneas was even if his swarmlings do. This meant that Aeneas could count on being able to sneak past Nineveh even with the creatures around him.

Slowly, Aeneas made his way past Nineveh’s swarm to the avatar’s tail. With the help of his man o’ wars, he was able to climb aboard the tail. Slowly he walked through the back of the avatar.

One swarm creature noticed the Inquisitor and lunged to attack but was swarmed by the man o’ wars.

Finally, Aeneas climbed to the shoulders of Nineveh’s avatar. He was so high up that he could see the battle unfolding before his eyes.

It was apparent that Lavinia was losing, really badly.

Nineveh could smell victory as he swung his arm towards Lavinia. The deep one girl avoided it, just barely.

The avatar’s movement was such that Aeneas held on tightly to make sure that he did not fall off. He finally reached the head of the avatar. Yet somehow Nineveh did not realize it, a testament to the good job that Lavinia had done in distracting the Swarm King.

Aeneas held tightly to his harpoon. He jumped off the head of Nineveh’s avatar and turned around completely so as to face the avatar.

For a brief moment, Aeneas and Nineveh saw each other face to face. And Aeneas fired.

The Inquisitor’s aim was true. Blood burst out of Nineveh’s head as the harpoon pierced his eyes.

With Nineveh’s avatar in disarray, his swarm creatures began to disperse. Lavinia saw this as her cue to attack and she did. Her swarm creatures mobbed Nineveh, and before long he collapsed onto the seafloor.

Aeneas watched the action unfolding as he was slowly falling to the ocean floor. He knew that he had won.

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