Yelena

“You ever feel like these dungeons suffer from poor design choices?”

“What?”

“I mean like, I’ve counted about 200 stalactites since I got down here – from Duskwood to this place. The city was a nice change of pace, sure, but now we’re slap back in another dark tunnel in another dark cave.”

“I’m sure the Everloft is sorry that it’s designs aren’t up to your specifications.”

“Interior decoration was never my strong point either, in fairness, but then I never was one for aesthetics. I’m more of a function over form kind of guy, no?”

“Marius, it never ceases to amaze me that in every conversation, no matter how abstract, you can somehow find a way to make it about you.”

“Hey, everyone likes to talk about what they know, eh? And in terms of Marius-related studies, I’m somewhat of an expert.”

This completely inane conversation carried them through the final stretch of Bhashera, and as they bounded on towards their final destination, Yelena had to admit that she was glad in a way: his pure stupidity was its own shield against the darkness of this place. That, and his chatter kept her mind off the inhuman screams that were echoing towards them from the mouth of the tunnel.

The whole cavern shook, sand cascaded down the sides of the tunnel walls, and Yelena could make out the dim, desperate chants of the Red-Woman as she flew towards the end of the tunnel ahead of them.

“Be safe,” she kept whispering. “Be safe. Be safe. Be safe. Be safe. Be-“

And when they finally emerged, almost falling over the edge of the cave mouth, they saw it:

Big, gruesome, roaring with unnatural strength – an abominable amalgamation of scorpion and woman joined at the hip like some grisly experiment given life.

“DAMN,” Marius whistled. “Look at them!”

Yelena watched the thing dive beneath the sands of its arena and snake its way towards the side of the room. As it slipped away she saw its three pincers follow it – each one looking like it could pierce through the thickest armor. It was on these tails that she focused and, with greater speed than ever before, caught the information she needed:

Appraisal: Success

DOMINION LORD: Frezia, Scorpionness of Bhashera

HP: 150/195

“Attack it at range,” she informed her team. “Stay out of reach of those pincers.”

“Yelena,” Marius said, practically salivating. “That ain’t what I’m looking at.”

She followed his gaze as the abomination rose from the sands again, its bloodied breasts flying with it.

“Look at the size of those things…” the transfixed rogue murmured. “Is the time for a little quick persuasion check really gone?”

As though answering him, the Scorpionness opened its mouth to reveal a mass of sharp insect mandibles, and let out a wail that chilled their bones.

“Does that answer your question?”

Marius already had his bow in his hands, taking aim at the beast’s mouth.

Yelena made to follow him when the Red-Woman suddenly cried out, like a child seeing its mother for the first time:

“LIGHTBRINGER!”

Yelena and Marius followed her stare and reaching hands, seeing two small beings cowering in the sand dunes below: a girl and a dog-man, possibly a Canis.

Yelena watched as the girl comforted her companion, seeing, even from this height, that the creature was doomed. The girl looked at her hands, and then at the tremoring ground beneath her as the Scorpioness howled, dove, and snaked its way towards them.

“Pyromancer…” Marius whispered beside her.

Yelena’s eyes were fixed on the redheaded girl as she stood ready to face the beast.

“That’s…the Lightbringer?”

She was so small down there. So frail – the sand-caked robe she wore hung loose from her shoulders. She bore some resemblance to the hidden statue in the depths of the Don’s palace, but that figure had been one of a headstrong woman with burning eyes. What rose down there, struggling to find her footing against the sands, was just a child. Couldn’t be more than sixteen.

But in her stance, there was confidence. Fury. Determination to meet the threat before her head-on.

And now Yelena saw it, too. The word that danced above the girl’s head as her own Appraisal finished:

Pyromancer

“I’ve never fought with a God before,” Marius remarked. “In fact, most of them tend to ignore me.”

Yelena unsheathed her blade as the Red-Woman’s eyes flew to meet hers.

“That’s no God,” she said. “It’s a Glancer.”

The eyes of the woman were pleading.

The Scoprionness broke free from the sands with a howl of triumph, ready to dive down upon its prey.

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And Yelena saw the tiny embers dancing in the red-haired Glancer’s hand.

Glance: 12/40

Weak, she thought. Not enough to kill this creature your kind made, is it?

The girl made ready to strike.

HP: 5/15

You’re going to die.

Once again Yelena shifted to the Red-Woman’s pleading eyes. No words passed between them. In this moment, their eyes communicated all they had to. All that they were, all that they needed the other to be, all was confined to this single, solitary moment that seemed to move in slow motion.

“Yelena!” Marius suddenly shouted. ‘Are we doing this, or what?”

The Scorpionness avoided the girl’s bolt of fire and shot its pincers towards her.

And with a heavy sigh, Yelena made her decision.

----------------------------------------

Amara

She watched the flames of her final projectile stutter and die. The mutant merely shrugged it off, and stretched its mandible-filled mouth open to engulf her and the final, flimsy servant she had.

Before the jaws descended, she considered the final option. Her flame was still strong. She could end it for them both, here and now, like Mendax said. A final reprieve from all their pain.

She looked down at his firm, hardened features. Despite the shock of losing his Brothers, he was still strong. Even with the poison that as bubbling from the gaping hole of crimson that once held his left eye.

“If this is destiny then…let us go. Let me be with my Bonded again.”

She looked away from the triumphant Frezia and readied her flame – her cloak, her gout – everything she could. She’d burn them all away in a final conflagration.

I’m sorry, mom.

She tried to stop her tears from falling.

I couldn’t be what you wanted me to be…

She gripped Mendax by his firm hand, stretched the finger of her right hand, and flicked –

“ARRRRRRGH!”

Her eyes flew open as she detected heat radiating off her back. Suddenly the shadow of the Scorpionness no longer consumed their forms in the sand. It shriveled away as its host fell to the ground, and then Amara felt the heatwave again – stronger, brighter, illuminating the whole cavern in a wave of crystal azure.

She looked back to see the Dominion Lord of Bhashera recoil against the arc of sapphire lightning that tore through its body. It went right through its claws, searing its chest and leaving a burning scar next to one that was already smoking on the creature’s surface.

Amara watched Frezia fall, overcome with more fury than she’d exhibited since their battle began. Then the vile creature rose, bile dripping from her insect mouth, and cast her eyes over the rest of her waiting eggs. They were pulsating for their maimed mother, almost like their hosts were begging to be consumed. To give their Broodlord back her strength.

As Amara tried to rise, Mendax growled from her feet. But not at her. Not at the Lightbringer – the so-called savior that she had to be – but at the figure that had just landed beside them both.

A girl.

A girl with pale skin, sapphire eyes, and blonde hair that gleamed even against the shimmering sands.

And from the threads of her golden hair, an aura of benevolent energy draped itself over Amara and the snarling Gnoll:

Guardian’s Ward (LVL I)

HP: +5

HP: +5

Amara felt her feet waver in the sands as she stood, barely even paying attention to the hungering Scorpion, now.

Her mouth opened, closed, and opened again. She couldn’t even visualize this creature standing before her so tall, delivering the life back into her chest that, mere moments ago, Amara was certain would finally be crushed.

“Lightbringer, I presume?”

The voice was tinged with the hardness of a warrior. As Amara merely looked on, dumbstruck, and a little amused by the irony of the golden warrior addressing her like this, the girl leveled her blade in both hands, planting her plated feet steady as a rock in the sands.

“Tsk!” Mendax spat through his open wound, though it seemed the golden beads were returning his energy to him. “Another damned Ch’alokk. Can’t you people just let us die?”

Amara regarded the pale girl again.

Ch’alokk…

“I have been called ‘you people’ more times than I can count,” the girl replied. “You may call me what you wish. But when this battle is over, I shall call you by your name.”

“You can have mine, now,” Amara croaked, coughing up the reside of sand in her lungs. “It’s Amara.”

“I thought you were the –“

“Don’t say it,” she spluttered. “That word’s brought me nothing but trouble.”

The golden girl chuckled, even as she faced down the demon from the depths of this hellish domain.

“As do most names other people give us.”

Frezia was climbing the far wall of her layer, clambering towards her eggs with feverish, relentless determination.

HP: 100/195

She couldn’t be allowed to heal again.

Before the warrior flashed her blade Amara pointed to the five remaining eggs, shouting over the din of the still screaming Scorpionness

“The eggs! It eats them to grow strong again. We have to-“

“Don’t have to tell me twice, Miss Bringer!”

From the shadows there flashed the searing light of pointed steel – five arrows spearing through the chamber that each found their mark one after the other. They embedded themselves in each bulbous egg and broke the yolk apart, sending the younglings tumbling out to fall to their deaths, choked by the sands below.

Frezia’s maddened eyes followed the deaths of her infants, and now her scream created a shockwave in the sands themselves.

Amara braced to stand against it but the girl stood before her, raising a glimmering shield that bore the brunt of the attack and kept them all – she, Amara, and Mendax – completely untouched.

“Never killed children, before!” a voice called out from the shadows. “Has a certain charm in it. ‘Specially since their mum’s such an ugly piece of work, minus her obvious assets in the mammary department. How ‘bout you, Yelena? Ever took down some Glancer kiddies?”

“Marius!” the girl called over her shoulder. “You aren’t exactly giving us the best first impression!”

And Amara only blinked in sheer disbelief. Never had she believed in the hand of fate – a concept that seemed so utterly unnecessary since she had her mother to guide her through life. But as soon as she heard that name tumble from the lips of the obviously crass man in the shadows, she couldn’t help but let her girlish curiosity take hold of her.

“You,” she murmured. “You’re…Yelena.”

The golden girl looked back. “The very same. Do I know you?”

Amara merely gulped down a childish giggle.

The Dominion Lord rose to her full height, craned her bloodied neck, and flung her arms wide.

“I don’t like this…” the voice in the shadows said.

Amara then gasped with frustration as four more arms sprouted from the beast – as though they were simply hidden appendages that they creature could have used at any time. Only now, without the advantages of its meal-children it could cannibalize, did it employ its final trick against them.

Scorpioness Frezia: Phase Two

HP: 100/195

Amara crouched as Mendax rose back to his feet, drawing his sword with a pained grimace.

“Mendax, you’re sure you can fight?”

He spat blood into the sands. “I’m not going to let another Ch’alokk girl take my chance of glory away from me.”

The golden girl smiled back at him, and he returned the gesture with renewed ferocity.

Are all warriors just insane? Amara found herself thinking.

“Marius? Remain in stealth. Focus on the thing’s eyes. Try and blind it.”

“Gotcha m’aam!”

Amara looked behind to see nothing but the craggy walls of the chamber. Whoever the girl was talking to, he was clearly a master of stealth.

“Warrior!” Yelena shouted back at Mendax. “We’ll have to save pleasantries for later. For now, just know that we’re here to help.”

“Obviously,” Mendax growled.

“I can see you’ve already done a number on her,” Yelena continued as the Scorpioness readied to make another dive. “If you can go high, I shall strike low.”

Mendax huffed. “This time, I’ll drop her.”

Amara looked between them all, feeling nothing but a strange sense of optimism, now.

That certainly made for a welcome change.

“Amara?” Yelena suddenly asked her. “Can you – that is –“

“Set her on fire?” Amara replied. “It’s my specialty.”

And then Amara saw her smile. The exact smile the dog-man above ground had talked about: Warm. Even in the face of darkness.

Well, Mr dog-man Dimedrious, she thought. Here she is. I’ve found your girl.

The newly formed demon of Bhashera came charging at them all.

“READY!” Yelena shouted.

But she doesn’t need me to protect her. Not even by a long shot.