Semua Bab Leesa's Advent: Bab 471 - Bab 480

Leesa watched as Leah and Kai emerged from the portal. As they crossed the boundary of the pulsating sphere their bodies seemed to shimmer for a moment, but they quickly solidified. The pair looked exactly as Leesa remembered them. Kai’s face bore his usual stoic expression, but Leah was smiling in friendly recognition.Behind them, the portal vanished as Ariandre let her magic go.Leesa stepped forward and wrapped her friend in a warm embrace. Leah hugged her back just as tightly.“It’s good to see you both again,” Leesa said when she let go of Leah. “Thank you for coming,”“Of course. Ariandre said it was important, so here we are.” Leah looked to the centaur. “How is it that you find yourself in this world, Ariandre?”“Leesa summoned me. I gave her the means to do so in gratitude for her help in saving my world.”Leesa held the starburst pendant away from her chest. &

“Oh, no! You didn’t!” Cali exclaimed as the claws of one of the horned demon’s hands tore through her shirt and scratched into her flesh. The demon sneered and reached for her with its three other arms, but once again Cali was too quick. Before it could grab her with its remaining hands, she pivoted and spun around behind it. With one hand braced on its bony shoulder and the other on its head, she bent its neck back with her vampire strength and sank her fangs into the leathery skin of its thick, gnarled neck. As she held it in the grip of her jaw, the freak batted at her with its arms while violently jerking this way and that, attempting to throw her off. Cali sank her teeth in deeper, feeling the tendons of its neck tighten as she bent its head back until she heard ligaments and sinew ripping and popping.Cali released her bite and spat. “Yuck! You taste as disgusting as you look.”Grabbing the demon with one hand on either side of

Before anyone else could act, a shimmering silver sphere began to envelope Ariandre. Before Lamashtu could stop her, she vanished, returned to her world. A moment later, the portal winked out. Leesa hoped that back in her magical forest, Ariandre would be able to heal herself.“Teleportation…” Lamashtu mused. “I must admit, I was not expecting that. If any others of you possess such an ability, I suggest you make use of it before it is too late.”Leesa took a small step forward. “Why do you do these things?” she challenged. “Why must you destroy everything? Why must you turn everything horrible and ugly?”“Why?” Lamashtu parroted. “That is a foolish question. I do it because I can. It is simply my nature. As soon ask the wind why it blows, or fire why it burns.” The demon’s gaze turned skyward for a moment, fixing on Jenna’s eagle form gliding gracefully on the air current

Leesa awoke slowly, her thoughts groggy, as if aroused from a very deep sleep. She was lying in a strange bed on her back, covered by a soft white sheet. A thin rubber tube ran into her nose, while a thicker tube snaked from her arm into a plastic bag filled with clear liquid hanging from a metal stand. As her thoughts grew clearer, she realized she was in a hospital. She had no idea how she had gotten here.She looked up from the bed and saw her mom and Bradley sitting on chairs beneath a long window. Behind them, she could see the sun beginning to set.“Mom?” she said.Her voice came out only slightly more than a whisper, but it was enough to cause her mom to bolt out of her chair, her expression a mixture of shock and delight.“Sweetheart!” she exclaimed as she quickly crossed the room and took Leesa’s hand in both of hers. Bradley was only a step behind to the side of Leesa’s bed.“What happened?” Leesa asked. Memories slowly came back to her. “Did the demon do this? Did we destro

Alcatraz Island, December 21, 2021A single keystroke changed the world forever.Three men huddled in front of the computer monitor. The guy pecking at the keyboard appeared young enough to pass for a college student, and his jeans and black T-shirt with a dripping red peace symbol on the front did nothing to disabuse the notion. The other two men—one in his mid-fifties, the other long past sixty—stood behind him, each dressed in a white lab coat. Their hunched postures betrayed their eagerness for this last task to be completed. The big moment was nearly at hand—the moment they had devoted eight years, countless man-hours and millions of dollars toward.All three men were universally acclaimed to be among the top people in their respective fields. Ask the CEO of any tech giant to list the top five computer programmers in the world and Briggs Brennan—the man typing at the keyboard—would show up on every list. He had joined the project two years earlier, at the ripe old age of twenty-f