Much was said in regards to the ethics of All-Father's continuously expanding empire, with many disagreeing on his goals even after the revolt of the Mad God, All-Father's clergy more than welcoming these dissidents, and even the most staunch iconoclasts do have the opportunity and more importantly, right to speak about it. A measure was implemented to avoid a second run of the Mad God's foolish plans.
The Years after Historian Marc's encyclopedia on the Divines volume 1
A gathering of Spirits was a rare sight to behold, the season's colors and smells. Animals and weather, mood and sentiments are all represented through their bodies and unique brand of magical might, Summer and Autumn, Winter and Spring mingled among themselves with gusto and rage both as discussions escalated into fights, then deescalated into merry and cheer.
A family ruckus if you will.
"It was your fire that blazed across my domain Pheonix! and that Sly Jackal!" The Spirit of the Armor, guardian of Wulfgram spoke as they settled down "Why? Lucrezia has been more than kind to us! She has given us hope! she brought back the last remaining creator! it spoke with a tone of voice that fluctuated between betrayal and amusement, cheer and sadness.
The Spirit, shaped as the great fire-borne bird of ancestral legend spoke, its voice tinged with feminity uncommon to their kin "We too received visions, and they had to be sent to the people of Wulfgram, Lucrezia's daughter is coming and with it great change should the human not be raised right, the forces beyond the cosmos conspire against us once again and we must defend our home, and she is the key to it" It flew to the middle of the gathering, behind her a great Jackal of blue flame stood upright, muscles rippling with fire and power.
"Listen to me Kin of the Cold, of the blessed rest for the land and animal both. We all must work together in this time of crisis even if it is far far into the future! Lucrezia aims to avenge us in the stars but we must safeguard her progeny on the ground! the mortals she trusts will also have offspring and they will clash as I have seen in my visions! Her mother is a strong one, but the child won't have that power while her peers will!" The Jackal swung his arms upwards, a great sphere of fire rose and fell with his breath as he calmed down.
"Prophecies, our kind did not heed the last one and we paid the ultimate price for it! this will not, must not repeat itself one more time! together we will ensure the girl is strong! capable and of sound mind! for when Lucrezia brings back the head of the Arch-Traitor we will feast on her divine entrails and finally avenge our masters!" he bellowed out as the Spirits cheered and roared around him.
And so it was, the final piece of the puzzle fell in its board, the consequences of it would pave the way for change, or great strife, but who could tell?
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Royal Princess Vaaltur watched as another swarm of glittering crystal drones, shaped like the cicadas of the overworld devoured another of her outposts, sighing at the fact this was the final line of forward bases she was allowed to build.
"I told them, Vurth, I told them to not kill those bloody Krakens! And now look at all of this! how are we supposed to conduct peace talks when my outposts are being devoured out of the sea floor by those accursed machines!?
The ancient Sea Elf turned to his sister, so young he thought to himself, her naivete was endearing to him in a way he couldn't properly explain. She wasn't aware of the duties her people had, nor their sins, she knew they had thrown their lot with a pantheon of Evil Gods and wrought misery to the world above, their rightful claim in the mortal coil but beyond that she was woefully ignorant, a measure put in place by their parents.
More like Queens and Kings, but it is their duty as avatars of our Gods, to conquest and kill until all are under our banner Vurth thought to himself, it had been a thousand years since the accursed First King of Vermilion and his gang of invaders came from the old world. And now Vaaltur wanted peace, peace that would never be real under any treatise or concession.
Only the peace of the Grave, of the Long Queue.
The shadows around them quivered as another woman appeared, smoke hanging around her form as the azure-tinged skin trembled at the cold of the room "My Lady! An important message from God-Queen Vuulpa" she handed a small scroll towards Vaaltur and kneeled.
"No need for the theatrics Custia, how was dearest mother?" Vaaltur asked.
"The queen is displeased with your foolish idea of peace with the land dwellers and openly mocked your failure with the Dynasty to the whole court, that message is your punishment Vaal, and not a good one at that" the Sea Elf woman sighed, Custia while not a sibling by blood was raised together with brother and sister and together they waged war but external and internal for their parents.
A good friend Vaaltur thought to herself, she opened the message and the words were short, with no hint of mockery she knew her mother was more than capable of which meant her Father was saving her from the worst, again.
"You are to dominate the Shogunate and from there the mainland. two legions will be granted for you to lead and not a man more, redeem yourself or perish in battle" she read out loud and saw the faintest hint of a grimace spread through her brother's face.
"I don't like dealing with those Samurai and their Ki-enhanced Monks, Mother wants you dead sister" he spoke and shook his head "But that won't happen, not while I am still alive, right Custia?"
Custia nodded "We didn't leave through a personal assault by the First King for nothing, these new Samurai are soft, unlike their Ancestors of yore, this will be an easier campaign without the Madwoman of the North and her infernal Machines harassing us!"
And so the army under Princess Vaaltur pulled back, their shadowy krakens and deep sea whales carrying horrors beyond mortal kind and Sea Elven troops alike towards the abyssal reefs and shoals near the coast of the Shogunate, it would take a while Vaaltur thought. A long while to build her strongholds, supply lines, and such but once she was done the landwalkers would remember the horrors of the deep.
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Even if, deep within her heart she only desired peace.
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Hvtial panted and sucked in air through his nostrils, his arm muscles burning with unholy fire as the cold mist seeped through him. He cursed his recklessness as he beheld his sparring partner strike a pose and enter into a combat-ready stance. Richard didn't push him this hard! and the man was one of his best friends! but woe was him that after a round of distilled spirits and horrible luck had him "ask" his girlfriend and combat lunatic for training before his group fight.
Quite the crowd had made their way to one of the combat arenas in the Academy's gym and not to toot his horns but Hvtial had landed some serious blows to the menace-made flesh in front of him, one of his flame-spilling attacks had her use some sort of never seen before Divine Miracle as she turned into a shower of raven feathers, and proceeded to fly upwards into a heel kick right into the left shoulder.
"We good?" she asked in a casual way that still caught the dragonkin by surprise, his decorum towards those of higher station protesting towards how casual an actual honest-to-goodness Duchess behaved but as his late grandmother used to say "Powerful people are often quirky" with a smile. She would probably smile seeing how one of the most important people of the Kingdom behaved towards her grandson.
"Good" Hvtial replied as he took another stance "Don't suppose you could use your blessing to make me strong like you did to that other feller eh?" Hvtial smiled but he already knew the answer, his blood was thin and the best he could do was phantasmagorical specters of it. Something Lady Kaede of all people was helping him as the Kitsune had a particular knack for it and together they would eventually turn him into a full dragon, in an illusionary fashion rather than flesh and blood.
Hopefully.
"If only friend, but the Good Mother is more than pleased with you, in case you are wondering" Lucrezia replied with a predatory grin that spooked him, Hvtial knew deep inside him that a beast lurked within that frame of sinew and bone, muscle and skin and it was more than ready to tear its way through the world. Tomoe and Rose disagreed with him on this but he honestly was glad Richard ended up with her, he was a good influence on the woman.
Lucrezia nodded and launched into a series of palm strikes that made her look like a warrior monk from the Dynasty. Explosive force and speed were the name of the game with her and Hvtial learned early that parrying with his scales was the best strategy for it, for a solid 5 seconds he parried, dodged, and counterattacked with his fists and legs. Lucrezia leaped backward and changed stances again.
Knees and Elbows, Kicks that exploded into his thighs and ribcage as the woman's sadistic glee poured like a misty haze out of her body. Hvtial turned to the grappling techniques Richard was fond of and with a series of dodges managed to grab her right leg with both hands, immediately spinning around and throwing her upwards as he readied a jump and hugged her torso mid-air.
Pure godsdamned muscle, Lucrezia was a killing machine of flesh as he grabbed her and slammed the woman into the ground, with a grunt of power he threw her to the edge of the arena as people cheered and howled. Lucrezia's arm slammed into the ground as the grinding of crystal and Mythril silenced their noise, she rose like a vengeful war Goddess and flexed.
With one arm behind her back and Crystal's arm in front of her, she extended her palm like a dagger only to motion with her slender fingers for him to come and get her. Hvtial heard the crowd gasp in awe, for the beatdown he had just unleashed on her would be enough to put anyone in the vicinity into a hospital for a few days. even their Knights looked in cold respect, they oft called Lucrezia the Gym's Duchess and Hvtial knew after that show of force, he had earned their respect.
"Richard's a good teacher," Lucrezia said as he stalled for time, Hvtial sucked in more air as his body burned from the inside, he was getting tired.
"Aye, he is" He replied with a grin.
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"Again!" the huge man bellowed out, his voice powered by weird illusionary magic that hurt whenever Richard got clipped by it, It was very much a different style of fighting but in no short part due to his new blessing, he was slowly managing to iron it out and overcome the Master Assassins's gauntlet of absolutely brutal training regiments! still, the overreliance on parrying and dodging made him...leery of the more explosive foes he could face.
Focusing his mind, he took a stance with the blade given to him by the Owl, single-edged and made specifically to parry other sharp instruments of pain, without having its steel chip or lose its edge with honest-to-goodness magical runes, so used he was to Lucrezia's brand of weaponry he had nearly forgotten the actual magical weapons and armors around him, although Vivienne still wielded that scary looking sword which he had confirmed with his girlfriend was an artifact of powers from the beyond, one detail that made him especially intrigued by it was the fact Hope out of all people had a small dagger that looked similar to it.
That little factoid he hadn't brought up, and as soon as the Owl saw he was ready the huge man leaped into action weaving incredibly hard to parry slashes and stabs, speed that no old man his age and size should be able to keep up and items, non-magical and magical to stun, confuse or harm him mid-fight. Including but not limited to stuns and smoke bombs, throwing knives that locked into him, and a phantasmagoria halberd that had given Richard a nasty scar already, when he got dragged by his shoulder into a slash that could've killed if this was a real fight.
Seconds dragged into minutes until he got a lucky jab in and the Owl faltered, with precision and controlled fury he went for the killing blow, only for another throwing knife to slam into the flat of his blade and throw him off, the Owl quick to regain his footing dropped a smoke bomb to his feet and Richard's mind went into overdrive as the hidden foe leaped into the arena, focusing his hearing and expanding his senses he began a mad dash outside of the smoke as the Owl and the new foe began trying to strike him down, but their attacks found no purchase as Richard deflected all of them.
Cheers and claps greeted him as soon as he left the smoke, the entire cabal of assassins watching his desperate fighting as a figure joined the Owl he was very familiar with, decked out in deep black garbs and armed to the teeth was the one Saa'ryu, loyal maid of his girlfriend and chief of her spy network, both were nodding with pride as the huge man spoke "Impressive display of martial skill young lord, most impressive indeed. See that you lousy lot! this is how you fight against insurmountable odds! no hesitation!" the crew snapped into attention as Saa'ryu guided Richard to a nearby bench.
The Owl started explaining the fight for his disciples as Richard felt the weight of his bones triple "That was fun, except for the part where you nearly gutted me at the end there" he spoke and Saa'ryu smiled "Aye, it speaks to your skills that you didn't get hit, I don't think even your little friend Hope and my Lady herself would've dodged that one, let alone parry it as clean as you did" she tapped her fingers as a small folder appeared "These are the men and women I've pooled together, unfit for the more slow pace spycraft work I require but if trained properly, can be used as a perfect subtle but effective hammer to whatever issues you would be daughter will face in the future, but Richard" Saa'ryu looked into his eyes "I do not like these weapons Lady Lucrezia wishes to supply them with, nevermind the fact our regular troops are getting absurd as it is, these new technologies she came up are downright..."
Richard sighed, it was rare for Saa'ryu to disapprove of her Lady, but he knew the signs and tells, the biggest one when she got formal about it "I'll talk with her, see if we can de-escalate it" he leafed through the files "Even I got spooked by some of the stuff she came up with it, those Magi-tech intelligence nodes are too close to that awful dungeon project the Imperium had, even if her stuff is based off Silicia and Crystal" Richard stopped at a file of an unremarkable looking man, looked barely 17 "Why is this young man marked as a team leader?" he asked.
The maid smiled "Oh let me tell you a story my future liege..."