Round 1 Part A-1v1 (2) [Archive]

Flames of Hyperion

03-10-14, 06:10 PM

Bluesteel spires soared into banks of low-running grey cloud, hindering them like jagged rocks might hinder the flow of a river. Wan starlight trickled through the resultant tears in the sky, but even brighter illumination emanated from nixstella lanterns set astride the wide open avenues. They glimmered gently upon the steady stream of evacuees, blue-white crystals lodged in the hard black setting of the cityscape.

Harsh climes bred hardy folk, and Eiskalt was no exception. Grim faces, obscured by long hoods and thick scarves, trudged calmly past with nary a word of protest or complaint. Every hand tightly gripped the haft of an axe, the limb of a hunting bow, or the strap of a leather satchel. New orders rippled through their ranks by means of muted mutters, and never had to be repeated twice. Soft snowfall, broken only by an occasional gust of piercing chill, muffled even the tread of their fur-lined leather boots.

He alone fought the tide, yet another rock fighting the river's flow. Hard grey eyes questioned he who dared to flout the decree from the ruling families to abandon the city centre to the invaders. Then they saw he was foreigner, of dark hair and dark eyes and gaunt round face, and wanderer, wearing tattered filthy robes wholly unfit for the Eiskalt winter. And they branded him fool, and they passed him by.

Nanashi, the nameless one, noticed them not. Instead he saw the world in the myriad eddies of its arcane blood, from the winds driving the snow-clouds overhead to the heartbeat of the leylines beneath the rock at his feet. Everywhere he turned the magic ran strongly, but also shrouded, as if shadowed by a darkness simply waiting to fall. Impending doom gnawed on the edge of his mind, scavenger rats nibbling at a frozen corpse.

He knew not how he had come to be in this dreary, desolate land. One moment he had collapsed to the snow in the depths of wild Berevar, the umpteenth time he had collapsed in umpteen days. He had dreamed fitfully but well, safe in the knowledge that none of his future realities would ever be as kind to him as the fleetest of moments in his dreams. And then he had awoken to the distant call of the alarm klaxons in Unum's central square, sirens that five minutes ago had ominously transcended into silence.

He knew little of the names whispered in muted hush upon the boreal wind. Of Eiskalt he recalled only a footnote in Arkakroth's Cross Continent Travel Journal & People I'd Like to Bludgeon, detailing an island nation to the far north unremarkable except for its history of turmoil and its potential natural resources. Of the Ixian Knights he'd heard rumours both good and bad, both hailing them as protector and decrying them as oppressor of faraway Corone. Of Misery Business his travels had taught him nothing at all.

But by now he could easily recognise the weary trudge of the oppressed and dispossessed. The steady streams of refugees fleeing calamities beyond their ken was nothing new to him. He'd seen it before, during the Corpse War in Raiaera, and just as he had unreservedly thrown himself into the fray then he could not sit back and hide now.

And he knew also what the sirens signified, as well as their abrupt silence. He could trace the darkness shredding his mind to the heart of Unum, from whence it emanated like seismic waves from their epicentre. The utter lack of news rippling back up the tide of refugees concerned him perhaps even more. Stoic, stern, grim as these folk may be, some things in the world...

The nibbling exploded. Superheated air washed over his face, blasting away meandering snow and racing cloud alike. Nixstella shattered beneath the forceful blow, sending shards of crystal scything into the ranks of evacuees. Heavy hide hoods and fur cloaks protected the vast majority from harm, bar a few trivial lacerations. But far more destructive still was the panic now spreading like wildfire from the rear of the column. The orderly retreat degraded instantly into a shoving, heaving free-for-all, with the young Nipponese scholar caught up in its midst. It was every man for himself, survival of the fittest, in the sudden desperation to flee from the entity of pure evil carving bloody swathes through tightly packed flesh.

It took a lot to faze one Eiskaltian, much less send a host of them into blind panic. The churning gears in Nanashi's mind belatedly realised the scale of the foe he now faced. He had not encountered such since battling the Dread Necromancer Xem'zund himself, in the climactic confrontation of the Corpse War.

His aching arms braced against the mass of humanity surging in the opposite direction, as all semblance of calm and composure dissipated like snow beneath the desert sun. His tortured thighs screamed as they fought to keep him moving forward through the stampede. The festering wound on his chest throbbed in timed agony with the waves of dread washing over his person, resonating with the blind terror of those all around him.

A hollow cacophony of incomprehensible fright echoed through his mind. Children screamed for lost mothers, mothers for lost children. Fathers bellowed war cries as they turned at bay to brandish their weapons at an unseen foe. The fleeing mob as an entity wailed and withered, fragile snowdrops subjected to brimstone and hellfire. Even the solid bluesteel spires seemed to shudder in sympathetic consternation as they watched him forge a path through the panicked press.

The dual musks of fear and death suffused his head. Every step he took against the tide carried him deeper into the suffocating cloud. It steamed from the pavestones like morning mist, plumed from the city wells like sulphuric geysers, settled in his nostrils like a malodorous fog. Every few seconds a powerful shockwave would cause it to dispel momentarily, but always it settled again within heartbeats.

Abruptly the crowds cleared.

Mutilated cadavers littered the street like so much discarded rubbish, the light dusting of snow soaked and running molten in steams of crimson blood. The rich, pungent aroma lodged in the back of his mouth was not that of mere death, but of total and utter catastrophe. Nanashi didn't know what to be more sorrowful and disgusted at himself for: the fact that he had been so close to the disaster and yet unable to prevent it, or the fact that he barely reacted to a scene that was becoming all too familiar to him. He fell to all fours and retched violently, wringing the contents of an empty stomach upon hands now buried in the still-warm entrails of a blank-eyed old man, but in moments instinct had kicked him back to his feet once more. Still spewing stale spittle, he forced himself to take a close look around.

He found himself standing alone in the centre of the open avenue, the only being still drawing breath save for a wailing child in an alcove of the spire opposite, and a young woman stumbling towards her with what looked miraculously like a mere twisted ankle. The relief on the mother's frost-hardened face clashed violently with the ominous fog rolling swiftly back in.

She disappeared in an explosion of eviscerated body parts and fine red mist.

The girl child screamed.

And Nanashi hurled himself at the abomination revealed, fire on his fingers and words of power upon his lips.

Nobody else would have to die today.

Not if he could help it.