Infinity Blade 02 - Redemption

floor with a crash. He leaped across the slablike table where he had been reincarnated, then separated one of the Devoted from his arm with a swing. The man went down, screaming.
    The other three engaged him at once. On one hand, he was proud that they showed such bravery in fighting, rather than fleeing. But on the other, he was disgusted. They knew the ancient protocols known as the Aegis code. True honor lay in engaging foes one at a time. Raidriar himself had instituted these codes millennia ago, seeking a more honest form of combat between men. Even the most brutish of his daerils followed the code. To have his Devoted ignore it, particularly in fighting Raidriar himself, was an insult.
    He dispatched the three with little trouble. Such a waste. He stepped over to the High Devoted, but the man was out cold from the knock to the head. That left only the one whose arm he had separated from its shoulder. Raidriar strode over and lifted the bloodied man into the air with one hand.
    “What did he say about me?” Raidriar asked, curious. “How did he turn you?”
    The Devoted squeezed his eyes shut and started whispering a prayer. To Raidriar himself, of course.
    “I’m right here,” Raidriar said, shaking the Devoted.
    “I will not listen to you, demon. You may wear the form of my master, but you are not him. He warned us of your coming. In his truth I bask, in his name I die . . .”
    “A Soulless,”Raidriar guessed. “The Worker has given my crown to a Soulless, has he?”
    A Soulless—a copy, a body awakened without the actual Q.I.P. to inhabit it. Such a thing was possible, but creations such as this were unstable, their memories flawed, their personalities erratic.
    “I put protocols in place to prevent something like this,” Raidriar said to the Devoted he held. “Why did you not spot the lies? You were trained better than this.”
    The Devoted was too busy dying to reply.
    Raidriar sighed, dropping the Devoted in frustration. The rest were dead or unconscious, save . . . Yes, the bulky man that still wore Raidriar’s mask. He knelt beside the fallen Devoted, noting the steady rise and fall of his chest. Raidriar pulled the mask free, needles sliding out of the skin of the cheeks and neck. He smelled the poison . . . what was left of it.
    Nightdew. It was meant to bring unconsciousness, not death. A temporary way to incapacitate a Deathless. Left too long under the influence of such drugs, the soul would break free to seek a better vessel, but it would work for a time. The Worker would rather not have Raidriar killed and his soul freed to travel to another rebirthing chamber.
    He checked the armor next, but as he’d suspected, it was useless. The joints of the elbows and knees had been welded together. If he had stepped into it and allowed it to enclose him with its automatic locking mechanism, he would have been trapped and immobile.
    They should not have tried the mask. If he had simply been allowed to put on that armor . . .
    He stood, increasingly annoyed, and investigated the deadminds in the room. He was locked out of any important systems. He could access the lesser functions, however—likely he had been left some small amount of control, so as to not arouse his suspicion should he look at his deadminds before putting on his armor. But anytime he tried to change something, the deadmind gave him some kind of excuse, speaking in a flat-toned feminine voice. The excuses were what might have been called “error messages” in ancient days.
    He did manage to find an image of himself, supposedly created only one week before. A powerful figure in lean, smooth armor. The face was masked, so it might not matter if the fake was a true Soulless or not, but it was his voice that accompanied the image.
    “My loyal Devoted,” the recording said, “cower and give awe. My prophecy is at hand, and my enemies work to deceive you. Stay alert and serve your lord.”
    It did sound like him, but it grandstanded too much. The Worker liked theatrics, but Raidriar despised them. One could know merely by looking at him—seeing the way that he stood, hearing the way he spoke—that he was of the elder Deathless. Trying so hard to emphasize it only made the impostor seem pathetic.
    Raidriar shook his head, keeping alert for the arrival of more foes. Daerils would be on their way, those who had been built for fighting. One would not be a problem, but several of them might possibly stand against one of the