Yelena

[Searing Strike: Activated]

Her sword sang through the air as soon as her feet hit the sands of the Gnoll courtyard. The guards surged forwards, halberds ready, aiming at the centre of the shivering black mass that was tearing through the sacred land of their home. But their every strike was rebounded. Their weapons met nothing but air.

Until Yelena’s strike found its mark, and a roar of pain issued from the still transforming Gnoll at the apex of this madness.

“THE…THE LIGHT!”

Instantly the shadowed form of the creature solidified. And when Marius’ next arrow was launched at the beast’s head, Yelena watched with satisfaction as the creature doubled back, shaking uncontrollably as it tried to dislodge the projectile from the center of its skull. Still, it staggered through its pain and unleashed a whirlwind strike on the guards that attempted to surround it, throwing them back, sending them sailing through the dry air into the destroyed houses of their kin.

“Get back!” Marius shouted. “Leave this to the Saviors of the Sands, eh?”

Only Amara had not yet struck a blow against the fiend. Yelena watched her ready herself on the sandy battlefield, amidst the destroyed huts of the stronghold, but no fire flamed into life in her palms.

“Lokar…” she whispered.

The creature’s eyes met hers, and in the next moment he blinked through the air and appeared before her face.

“YOUR LOKAR IS GONE, CHA’LOKK BITCH!”

His claws struck out at her and she summoned a protective barrier of flame – a blooming, infernal flower that repulsed the shadow and gave Yelena room to follow up with a vertical slash across his torso.

He howled as her blade ate through his flesh, rolling away into one of the emptied Gnoll huts and coughing up his stickly purple blood.

Yelena’s eyes found Marius out there – standing atop one of the huts with his bow drawn, ready, trying to find his target in the smoky haze of the hut’s remains.

Yelena readied her bloodied blade before her, stepping in front of Amara and focusing her eyes on the gradually settling dust.

“Friend of yours?” she asked.

Amara eyed her with hatred, but shook her head.

“That’s not him,” she replied. “That’s something else.”

Yelena nodded. “Voidspawn possession. You saw his eyes, didn’t you?”

Amara nodded slowly, keeping her own eyes focused on the hut’s remains.

“He made a deal with a devil,” Yelena continued sadly. “Whatever his reasons, this is what it turned him into.”

“It’s my fault,” Amara whispered, her voice being swallowed by the rising scream of fury emanating from the dust-caked hut. “I drove him to this…me alone…”

Before Yelena could question her further, she saw Amara’s eye go wide and turned to meet the fiend that had just launched himself at them both. Her shield came up just in time to meet his assault and yet still she felt herself pushed back, trying to weather the blow that still managed to cut through into her flesh.

How?

[ABILITY USED: HEARTSEEKER]

[STATUS CONDITION RECEIVED: BLEEDING]

[EFFECT: -2HP-4HP/5 sec]

She looked up to see the rabid eyes of the beast move around like billiard balls as his next strike came again – both his arms lunging at her with inhuman strength. One of them lolled out of its socket – the one she’d managed to cut through – and yet it still slashed out at her, commanded by the otherworldly strength that now flowed through its master.

“Marius!”

It was all she could do to keep her shield up and hold the creature her, even as it pushed her further back with every slash its daggers made against her. Marius’ arrows kept flying through the air, embedding themselves in the blackened beast’s back.

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It did nothing but laugh.

[MORPHOLOGY: DESERT GNOLL (POSSESSED)

PROFESSION: THIEF

HP: 100/125

She tried to look for an opening and found nothing. She needed space. She needed to let her blade fly through the air again…

[SHEILD BASH: ACTIVATED]

Her buckler met the body of the beast and she pushed against him, matching her strength against his. Not enough. She felt her feet skid back, sinking into the sands and burying themselves there. Invisible wounds started opening in her skin – wounds inflicted by the creature’s bleeding ability.

HP: 21/20

She stared into the eyes of the creature as they struggled against each other.

Reflected back at her were not the eyes of a Gnoll thief. Instead, she looked into the face of something far more sinister, and far more familiar.

“Hello, Argent,” He spat in her face.

And they way he said it, coupled with the fierce look of pure hatred radiating out from his reptile eyes, confirmed her suspicions.

“…Nils.”

His smile was that of a sadist enjoying every minute of torturing his prey.

And then it dissipated – snuffed out by a searing, white-hot fire that burned through his back and winded him enough that her shield bash finally managed to push through.

“Let him go!” Amara roared, a gout of flame spewing from her hands.

Yelena threw him back as he burned under the onslaught and, as he tried to recover his footing, sliced across his scintillating skull.

He sank to the ground, blood pooling under his ruined head, and yet the sick smile on his broken face had returned again.

“Amazing what a few drops of your cunty blood will do.”

She watched as his flame-drenched face began to regenerate before her – shadowy tendrils pulling the beast’s lolling jaw back together.

“Yelena!” Marius screamed from above them all. “Light up!”

She surged forwards in the same moment the Gnoll’s arm shot out to catch her sword, and his darkened tendrils climbed up the blade, dimming its edge, and the shimmer that was starting to run through it.

She tried to move – no use.

“HeheheheHA!” the grim beast cackled, face now wavering between forms – that of the Gnoll, and that of the spirit lying behind its eyes, the spirit of the dreaded Blackbird’s chief Yok’ra.

“Yelena!”

It was Amara’s voice – cut off just as soon as she cried out her name. The possessed creature’s head spun, caught the girl in the vice-like grip of its other hand, and pinned her to the ground by her neck, covering her face with its vile corruption.

Its tail shot out in the same way to knock Marius from his position atop the only still standing Gnoll home. She watched him dive, avoiding the blow, and then disappear into the dust.

“Y’know something?” Nils whispered into her, the sound evoking the memory of his tongue caressing her neck, moistening her up for him to violate as he pleased. “I cursed the old Blackbird for making me this. I thought he just wanted me gone. But – heh! – I gotta admit, it feels good,” he said, licking his lips. “All this power from the thing inside you – from just a little fucking piece of it! All this power you won’t even use because you’re a prissy little bitch. Well, if you won’t use it, I sure as hell will.”

She met his stare and looked through all of them writhing within the puppet of flesh that held her while she bled out. The Gnoll, the Yok’ra, and – finally – the thing behind them all. Powered by rage. By desire.

Its voice came from within her again, and she realized how stupid she’d been this whole time:

They have already taken scraps from my table and fed them to their dogs…If you shall not accept me - if you hate me and my ugly world - then see what awaits you when those made of sterner stuff claim your destiny for their own.

HP: 14/30

“You just don’t get it, do you?” the corrupted creature hissed in her face. “I fought you on the Sands. I fought you in the shithole below the ground, and I’ve followed you all the way here. You led me right to the base of these pathetic little shits. And once I’m done with you, they’re next.”

Suddenly: a spark. Something radiating through her body, down into the hilt of her blade.

“Should probably have some fun first though, eh?” Nils giggled, blissfully unaware of the heat starting to emanate from her sword. “Wonder what Lightbringer pussy tastes like…”

He looks to Amara and sees the fire burning in her eyes. More than just fire -the searing aura of Glance moves between every fold of her skin, and when she smiles up at the dark creature, it feels that same energy pierce the side of its stomach.

Yelena twists her flame-coated blade and feels the innards of the Gnoll spill out as she withdraws her sword and falls to the ground. She watches him burn – the Gnoll, and the beast behind his eyes.

Incantation: Infernal Armament

GLANCE type: PYRO

Effect: Weapon applies status condition {BURNING} to opponents. Burned opponents take 1-5 pts of fire dmg for 5 secs

Yelena looked to Amara’s smirking face as she rises, and together they nod and lunge for the corrupted Gnoll before he even has a chance to spit in their faces.

Amara sends two fireballs into his open wound which explode inside him, blasting what remains of his ribs apart and sending them flying across the sands.

As the shadow drapes itself over his gaping side, Yelena spreads her feet and brings her blade across the air with a roar of righteous fury:

[SEARING STRIKE: ACTIVATED]

And as her the burning light of her blade cleaves through the air, she saw that her shimmering azure light was now replaced by a whole arc of glimmering pyrophoric brilliance.

[SYNERGY: UNLOCKED]

SEARING STRIKE + GLANCE ENHANCEMENT

ENHANCMENET (PYRO)

ABILITY UNLOCKED: INFERNAL STRIKE

DMG: 1-10 PTS (PYRO) + 20 PTS (LIGH)

When the arc of brilliant flame met the creature’s torso it tore clean through it, sending his upper body flying into the air and leaving behind nothing but a set of spasming legs spewing a geyser of black blood into the air.

The *Ding!* of a Critical Hit struck Yelena’s ears just as the twitching body of the Gnoll touched down beside her.

And its legs merely fell into the sands, bleeding into a dark pool that seeped into the ground.

Amara watched the twitching Gnoll’s face stare up at her. His mouth moved, trying to say something with his final, fleeting breaths. Yelena couldn’t be sure, but it might have been something close to “I’m…sorry…”

But they had little time to ponder his words.

Yelena’s eyes met Amara’s as the ground began to shake between them, their legs started to wobble, and the Gnolls who were watching from behind the rubble strewn battlefield sprinted away inside the keep.

“Yelena! Redhead!” Marius called out from the wreckage all around them. “Get out of there!”

Both girls managed nothing but a gasp when Lokar’s pathetic form imploded and covered the sands all around them in a black tornado, lifting them off their feet and into a blank, formless void.

Reality ceased to be, and Yelena heard a voice she never thought she’d never hear again.

“Welcome, my daughter, to the end this world.”