You just had to fuggin’ ask. You’re the one that did it! You’re me doofus! Oh, right. Fudgebutter. Low on resources? Check. In hostile territory? Check. Solo? Check. Spotted by a frickin’ thunder dragon? Check. They’re out here amassing some troops to do something or other, troops that contain mages? Check. Too slow to outrun them? Check. Are we at least a little bit boned? Check.
Well, screw it. I need more dragonforces anyway, and I know for a fact they’re a Terrorzin loyalist. Holy hell though, look at those. There’s got to be close to a thousand kobolds, and anywhere from ten to fifty percent of them are casters of some sort. Reggie? Yeah? How and why do you keep getting into these sorts of situations? How the hell should I know!?
Y’know what’s funny? What? I was just thinking that I hope Lu packs sashimi platters instead of bug meat, because of how much bug meat we ate for a while. What if she bought you some fruit or produce? Ooooo. You really aren’t concerned at all about the horde below are you? Nah, the kobolds can’t reach me too well. The thunder dragon could kick my arse though. For now the dragon is just watching. I *can’t* move on without taking them out, because I’d be trying to sleep somewhere within their travel range easily. They’d find me and kill me in my sleep if they don’t attack now. Y’might as well do this right then. How so? You know the drill. Ah, yep.
Heaving a sigh, I wonder how close I have to get to be able to issue the challenge. Crap. The dragon’s charging its breath weapon. Even if it’s pretending to not come after me, I have no choice now but to head it off at the pass. Time to drift down, maintaining my telekinetic surfboard, and another square behind me, and another square above me, in case the dragon should blast me to knock me around. I think if I hold my breath, I might go flying softly, without having my bones or innards crushed by thunder breath. I might possibly very well be immune to the worst of the damage that a thunderer can provide if I’m very lucky. If not, I can try to put up an adamantite Steely Body, but I feel like I’m going to need my S P to fight my way out of this.
Drifting down, I hear, her, Attraxiaz, apparently, shout, “I am Attraxiaz the Loud, she who thunders. You who possess the dragonforce of Olashax and Vanathar trespass, and so have sealed your doom.”
Shrugging casually in response, drawing Frostburn and pointing in a sweeping motion that covers her and all her troops, I address Attraxiaz, “I regret to inform you Lady Attraxiaz the Loud, she who thunders, that I offer you one chance to surrender. You can infer my power by the dragonforces I possess, for I am Reggie Shellcracker, a Hero of the Order of the Onyx Dawn, archmage Aliased Schism, and I am the Void Dragon Honoris Causa!”
To her credit, Attraxiaz pauses, and motions for all of her troops to stand down and retreat into a formation further away. They take heed and immediately follow her command. She calls back, “And what does surrender look like, to an enemy of the Ice of Rage? An enemy of Terrorzin?”
I try not to let any hesitation show as I gnaw the inside of my lip while offering, “Live with us, live in peace, enjoy your lives, abandon Terrorzin. Fight alongside us if you would choose to, but only commit to non aggression with us at the very least, on pain of death. Or, barring the willingness or ability to comply with those, accept exile to the Untamed Lands. I wish for peace, happiness, safety, and love for all upon Rayileklia. I wish not for needless bloodshed, but I have already slain countless, and I will slay countless more.”
Is she truly, possibly considering this? She’s shrinking. She’s taking a human form, with wings, and approaching. I get the sense that she has stopped charging her breath weapon, though she can’t abandon the charge she’s already acquired.
Attraxiaz is not a conventionally beautiful woman, with her extra folds of flesh, but she is some degree of pleasing to the eye, even in her rounded form, with the smooth, evenness of every bit of her, her comely, average face, and a head of shining cobalt hair that seems like almost a dual mohawk in addition to shoulder-length tresses. She approaches to within thirty meters, to within ten, to within five, and stops approximately four meters away, flapping to remain aloft. I offer her an invisible telekinetic square to stand on, surprising her, and I bring us closer together.
She nods, understanding in some small degree my power. I make certain that I put us exactly at equal eye level, so that she can address me directly, and she does, “This is no small request you make of someone whose lands you are trespassing in.”
I nod, and apologize, “I know, for that, I am sorry, but I do not have faith that you wouldn’t personally kill me as I rest for my continued assault on the forces of Terrorzin to your northwest, Shiz and Tinth. If I have any reason to believe you will warn them of my coming, I must slay you and all of yours. I am truly, horribly sorry. I hate the idea of taking lives.”
Attraxiaz eyes me calmly as she states, “Your confidence is— unsettling. The fact that you possess two dragonforces of two men I know were alive this morning, and are completely unharmed, is similarly unsettling. When I say what I’m about to say, please allow me time to further explain.”
I nod, trying to fight back the wetness in my eyes, the sadness in the belief that I may have to strike down this woman who seems to be reasonable. Attraxiaz takes note of it, keenly aware of what my sadness might mean, after what I’d just said. She begins, “I cannot personally turn against Terrorzin. Please, please do give me time to continue. Nor can my clan, my kinsmen. You have no guarantee that if we began marching south to the Untamed Lands, that we would make it there, rather than simply turning around after you left. I know that you can not offer us this degree of trust. Instead, I— I beg a moment of your time to come to terms with a solution I might offer.”
I take her in in her entirety, increasing my aura vision to its maximum as I attempt to seek any duplicity. I scan her thermal output as thoroughly as I can, attempting to read changes in her heart rate. She is nervous, but that’s understandable. I offer a slight tilt of my head in a nod of agreement to her request of a moment.
The slightly portly woman heaves a sigh, and looks down at her followers, her gaze softening, before turning back to me, with her own eyes ever-so-slightly wet. She states, “If I give up my life to you, my dragonforce, they will follow you unflinchingly, undyingly loyal. This I swear. If I announce to them my intentions, and allow you to execute me, and drink of my dragonforce, I—. Please, spare them. Take their loyalty, and simply see that they lead good lives, if you truly offer the surrender and mercy that you—. Please. Accept my surrender, my head, and my heart, for my people’s lives.”
My heart wrenches and I can’t stop my lower jaw from quivering as tears form. I take a deep breath in through my nose and fight to loose it with patience and control. Before I can respond, she kneels on the telekinetic square in front of me and states, “If you accept, please allow me a moment to convey my request to my people, and then remove my head. I—, my body has some thunderous charge. It is no attempt to deceive you. I dare not unleash it for fear of invoking your wrath. I know not exactly what will happen to this charge upon my death.”
Hell. Hell, gorram hell. Why? Why Terrorzin!? You piece of crap! I fight to keep my breathing as close to even as possible as I try to make the mulling of my response both casual, and sincere, “I’ve rarely heard sincerer words spoken. I’ve used magic to detect your heart, and sense any magic that you may have been concocting, and the magic that your followers may have been preparing. Your heart is nervous, but it doesn’t falter or fail you. It shows me no deception, and your face and eyes have contained the same. I believe the sincerity of your offer. I hope you understand why I would be loathe to accept it. Why I despise taking lives. Why I hate this war and I hate Terrorzin.”
Her heart does skip beats in fear as I say I would be loathe to accept her offer, her face flicks back upwards to meet my gaze with tears in her eyes, before she can jump to conclusions, I offer, “I mean a compromise, that may still result in accepting your offer. My reasons for loathing accepting such an offer are that I would be ridding the world of an earnest individual, whose care for their followers is supremely evident. You say you cannot turn against Terrorzin, and this means you could not even accept living in Moun— in our lands, in peace?”
There’s a careful, slow, trembling shaking of Attraxiaz’ head as she responds, “I— I couldn’t see my people turned against Terrorzin while I live, knowing they would die at the might of his hordes. I would much rather die than see them put to death in such a cruel fashion, and I can only hope that my life buys them some time before you decide to use their loyalty in such a manner.”
Terrorzin, I’m going to f’kin’ kill you. I inhale a ragged, slightly sobbed breath. I try to pick apart her argument, “It seems that implications are that, if you believed I could trust you, if you believed I would not turn around and slaughter you out of fear of duplicity, if you believed that I made the safety of your clan paramount, and prevented them from being forced to face the hordes of Terrorzin by abusing your surrender or loyalty, that—. Attraxiaz the Loud, Thunderer. I invite you to follow me to where I will rest, and to watch over me in my sleep. You can either leave your clan here, or have them follow at a distance. I offer you my vulnerability as proof of trust that my offer of surrender and mercy is genuine. Will you, and I implore, no I beg you to, accept this offer?”
The concern, fear, mistrust, and mix of swirling emotions painted across the furrowed brow of Attraxiaz is communicated in an instant, before she glances back down to her horde, her minor army. She chokes on her words, “You are so confident in your survival, when you’d said you were worried I may send my clan after you, or take you down in your sleep. I sense no hesitation, no fear for your own demise. I’m not quite certain there is any vulnerability you can show me. Especially knowing you are truly to storm the stronghold of Shiz and Tinth alone after resting. But—,”
She gulps, terror in her eyes as she gazes back my way, wetness playing across them before she continues, “If your offer is true. Yes. I do accept. I simply beg that if you decide to slay me after all, that you spare my clan. Especially the young, and moreso, the clutch I’ve secreted away from our bastard overlord. Please do me this kindness. I give you power over me, my greatest secret, my greatest weakness. Save them. I beg of you. If you are waging a war against Terrorzin, save my clutch. I don’t care what happens to me.”
I am going to murder the everloving Shiz out of Shiz, Tinth, and Terrorzin. My stomach grinds itself into knots as I ask, “Would you like your clan to follow at a distance, or would you care to accompany me alone?”
There’s hesitation in Attraxiaz as she considers, and glances back at her clan. She gulps before requesting, “May I, glp, give them the order of my offer?”
I nod, so Attraxiaz turns away from me to boom her voice down to her people, “I go now with our intruder, for your safety my kinsmen! The Void Dragon Honoris Causa will lead you if I do not return by nightfall tomorrow! You must accept the Void Dragon’s leadership in the case of my death, for there is great mercy in their hands. Please, enter our burrow, seek rest and abandon ranks and formation. Place only one scout here, at the entrance, awaiting my or the Void Dragon’s return.”
Hesitantly, she turns towards me, nodding, so I wait while her clan makes itself scarce, and begin lowering us westward towards the ground. When it's only the two of us, I let my Honoris Causa recede. I summon two of the ghostly steeds from my ability, using the third one to partially enhance our conjured two. Mounting, I motion for Attraxiaz to join me, and we begin riding northwest.