Empire Builder 1: Breed, Populate, Conquer by Dante King (free e books to read online txt) 📕

emerged from the other side of the village, where presumably more stone blocks hurtled toward the crystal shard.

Glancing over his shoulder, Ben saw the stone pile rising in height. It grew to the height of a high-rise apartment, then kept growing until it was the height of an inner-city skyscraper. Then it kept right on growing.

The tower in his vision had been obsidian, not pale stone, but Ben supposed he could be content with either.

The earthquake hadn’t stopped. The others breathed heavily as they all kept running, not knowing when the tower would stop growing. Nipper loped along beside Ben, his eyes wide and his ears flattened against his furry head.

Sir Gallant the Younger was now perched atop Sir Gallant the Elder’s shoulders. “Oh shit!” he squeaked in fright as a boulder shot across their path.

The rumbling in the ground beneath began in earnest. Ben and the others were thrown from their feet. They scrambled up and kept going, lurching as though they were on the floor of a ship in a storm, their arms shot out to their sides to keep balance.

Looking back, Ben saw the tower rising upward. Its top was shaped like a crown, just as he had seen in his vision. It had a long and spindly neck. The base splayed out like a ziggurat, visible above the smashed wreckage of the village.

The pyramid base grew broader and wider as it rose out of the earth, shrugging off dirt and destroyed huts like dust. The very ground beneath the feet of the party was being pushed up like soil before a plow, forcing them to keep on running.

Then, just when Ben thought they could run no further, the rumbling stopped. A huge thud like thunder rang out, sending out a wave of wind that bent the trees at crazy angles.

An eerie silence fell, one that chilled Ben to the bone.

Everyone stopped, breathing heavily.

“Is that it?” Sir Gallant the Younger demanded.

Ben glanced at him skeptically. The impudent homunculus hadn’t even had to run himself.

“I’ve never summoned a building before,” Ben shrugged. “I couldn’t say--”

His words were cut off by a boom like the sound of a cannon, but amplified to rock concert levels, the noise loud and jarring enough to make Ben feel like his teeth were rattling. The tower flashed a blinding white, and a column of flame shot up to the heavens. The very clouds around it were scorched into non-existence, dousing the travelers with a sudden downpour.

The flame burned brighter and brighter, forcing Ben and the others to shield their eyes. Then, with a crack and a hiss of heat, the flames went out.

As the light dimmed, allowing them to look again, Ben saw that the tower was in fact now made of obsidian. The stone had been burnt all the way through, turning it a gleaming, translucent black like glass. It looked identical to the structure he had witnessed in his vision.

From the enormous ziggurat base to the wide fanged crown at the top, the black glass, dark as night, gleamed in the sunlight.

“It’s beautiful,” Imogen breathed.

“It certainly is,” Ben agreed.

Melody wordlessly took his arm and nestled close to him, her heart still pounding from the run.

Ben pointed up at the tower. “Welcome to our new home.”

“A fine establishment, if I may say so, sire,” Sir Gallant the Elder said.

“You may indeed, Sir Gallant.” Ben enjoyed ribbing the somber knight by parodying his tone, but the joke was lost on the morose soldier. It was not lost on his mischievous younger self, who laughed at his elder self’s expense.

Ben was itching to inspect his new home. He’d never even really dreamed of owning a house, let alone a skyscraper that would put modern towers to shame.

The landscape was vastly changed now that the whole village had been bulldozed by his ziggurat. It had been uninhabited, so nothing of value had been lost. That thought only made Ben more determined to ensure the mountain ogres received their just reward for raiding and slaving, but that was a problem for later.

“I’m going to inspect our new home now,” Ben said. He turned to look at the three nymphs. “Ladies, will you join us?”

Vinata, acting once more as their spokeswoman, replied. “We would love to inspect your new home with you, if you permit it.”

Ben laughed. “I don’t think I was quite clear. When I said our home, I meant that the three of you are welcome to consider it your home too. If you don’t have to be anywhere else, that is.”

The eyes of all three women went wide.

“Do you think you can handle living in a home made of stone, Vinata?” Ben teased. “Come on, let’s take a look. Sir Gallant,” he turned to the knights. “Uh, both of you, can you patrol the grounds and watch for enemies?”

“Of course, my lord.” The larger knight stood to attention.

“And let me know if you see anything I might need to know about, anything suspicious, or valuable.”

“I shall give you a full report.” The knight laid the deer carcass on the ground, saluted, and marched off to start patrolling a perimeter around the village.

Ben craned his neck to try and take in the tower as they walked closer. They had run about half a mile in their efforts to escape the earthquake of destruction the growing tower had caused. Now the base of the tower itself was only a hundred yards away, meaning the whole first floor must have been nearly a mile across.

Although the pyramid at the base was formed in steps, the surface of each step was rounded. The entire tower was so glassy and smooth, not a single foothold was presented anywhere. Unless an enemy had flying mounts that could reach the stratosphere, Ben felt confident they would not need to defend any part of the tower except the entrance.

The smooth surface didn’t deter Nipper from attempting to explore. With a run and a leap, he launched himself at the bottom step, scrabbling