"Did he say, Supreme… Void… Imp?"
I could not answer High Matron Etyl. Nor could I hear the skull attempt to describe the strange sight before me. Every soul present was petrified; locked in the most primal state of fear capable of existing in the minds of mortals. The slaughter- no, the destruction ceased; forced into stillness by the vilest energy to befall the Mortal Plane.
Even from here, I could feel it. A mindless malevolence that promised a perpetually unchanging emptiness. The Void, personified as a black ball of tarry flesh gilded in unholy light; undulating and waving as whatever creature within went against its nature by undergoing a rapid change.
When that change was complete, white webs cracked along the surface with the soul-piercing intensity of a whisper, shattering the now-solid sphere into unseen fragments and a solitary figure that put a small crater in the shores as it landed, despite it hardly being off the ground in the first place. But it- Amun, stood without issue.
He stood half his former height, but his eyes were the same. White and draconic. Yet, that same white glow was present at the corners of his hairline, appearing like stretch marks around a pair of large bumps. Just like the marks within the long claws on his webbed hands and feet, and the fine tunic beneath his skin-tight clothes of semisolid darkness. And he had a tail. Thin, but tipped in a chevroned barb that flicked menacingly with blinding speed.
"Oho! So-it's-like-this, huh?" He laughed in a high-pitched reel of nearly incomprehensible words, and his movements were just as fast. Causal motions were a blur of black against white, making him seem to stand amidst a flickering aura, somehow smiling or moving his hands to his eyes and back to his sides without making any apparent movements.
Moving dramatically slow yet blindingly fast, he made a swimming motion to ascend to the skies, where he let out a cackling howl of wicked laughter before swimming toward the remaining few units in a blur of darkness and wicked laughter. His claws, abyssal black with white blades, hardly left marks as they bounced off of steel yet were nimbly quick enough to snake under plates to lacerate, disembowel, behead, stab, or disarm the disorganized ranks. No blood poured from their wounds, however. Akin to the man Amun bit, their flesh withered and shriveled by the second, leaving them despairing amidst their scrambling comrades while the few who could keep up with his speed raced to catch up with him, launching everything from arrows to spells both precise and wide-reaching.
One of the few elves was among them, gaining some zeal as the void imp valuted through the trees. An arrow of green mana was sent through Amun's leg, sprouting a writhing mass of brambles to hold him. The apparent opening encouraged the rest, given the intensity they launched their spells, creating an auspicious moment for the engaging force when the brambles began to wither against his fiendish skin.
Following the elf's lead, a human shot a lance of fire through Amun's other leg, yet the magical blade remained impaled in his leg, radiating a blinding light that guided the volley of lances streaming behind it. With two others matching his speed, they barreled into his abyssal body with reckless abandon, making the Elven Devil scream out in pain for the first time since our initial meeting. He darted and waved in an attempt to escape and scramble the mana yet found he had little control over such things in his state. Thus he remained unguarded from the massive earthen hammer materializing and swinging into him.
I thought he was finished as he tumbled through the air like a heavy stone. As did his enemy, for they seemed satisfied to watch him impact the shores less than a hundred meters away from their cannons, leaving craters as he bounced to a halt; even going as far as laughing when the last bounce left him staggering on his feet, only to send him crashing down onto his back.
Their mirth evolved into an outright cheer as the seconds passed, then a full-on celebration once that foul stench disappeared; short-lived though it was. In the following moments, some began to weep as they turned their eyes to the relatively few survivors and remembered the thousands vaporized, ignoring the calls of their commanders attempting to regroup. Witches and recovery mages sprang forth from the back, desperate to heal the wounds they detected from afar, only to fall into despair when they saw those with pieces of their souls missing.
Just as quickly as it began, it seemed to have ended for the barbarians of Shujen. Yet we could see the gilded darkness rising from below to sink into Amun, burning the last bits of wickedness from his form. The markings faded to nothing and the tail dissipated into darkness, leaving the sharp-toothed drow I'd come to know rising from his crater to face the rows upon rows of cannons with half-lidded eyes.
To their credit, there was no wasted time among the barbarians. The first one to spot Amun fired and the rest followed suit. Some did not even aim their weapons, apparently thinking it better to let loose and compensate on the next shot. They never got one. Like the arrows at the start of this chaos, Amun sent out a wave of his purple magic, sending the cannonballs whirling around his body before releasing them at twice the speed across the batteries. Then he looked to his feet.
"Alright, Lana. I almost died for real that time so you're up. You know the rule."
"Yeah, yeah. No civilians. You didn't exactly give me much to play with, though."
"Next time."
The undying woman of darkness let out a little giggle, then released a maniacal laugh as Amun's shadow widened, allowing countless zombies, skeletons, and shadows to step between him and the barbarians. But it was those like her who were the most formidable.
They held every power one could think of whether they be affinities or classes. The first one- Lana, flew into a barbaric rage the moment she came within range of someone, using her absurd strength to rip them apart with her hands before she went on the prowl. Meanwhile, Amun simply… walked.
He casually strode through the chaos on a path towards the castle, easily avoiding the many martial undead felled from his ki, fighting what remained of the opposition. His expression was mute as he watched his shadows hunt down the retreating or surrendering barbarians with extreme prejudice, yet he tracked his skeletons blockading the city with sharp intent. His focus was unbendable amidst this chaos; unlike ours.
When High Matron Etyl gathered her wits and dragged me into the city, all had gone quiet. The surviving humans took it upon themselves to barricade themselves in their homes to watch the lone figure standing before the castle. He did not seem to notice us upon our arrival, but he began shifting regardless, removing an as-of-yet-unseen spear from its rest on his shoulder to begin spinning it around so that the sling attached to the butt end picked up a little more snow, ice, and rock with each pass. Then it was launched.
A horrendous whistle- a screech that could put a banshee to shame announced its departure. Yet the resulting crash was something few creatures could replicate. The comparatively small mass of rock and ice punched neatly through the wall and waited a split second before releasing its energy. There seemed to be no resistance. Just a plume of icy dust that blocked the view of stone falling to touch the ground for the first time in centuries. But the whistles kept coming.
Again and again, Amun threw the accelerated rocks into the wall, sometimes curving them impossibly to the sides or the rear until all that remained was a castle sitting atop a mound of rubble. Then he continued his walk, paying little mind to the many corpses strewn about as he approached the last standing section of the wall. Through our little windows, though, we saw three different scenes playing out.
On one, we saw the rotund Gerdian, Blude, dragging a massive barbarian through the deep waters of Shujen Bay with the utmost ease. Her companions remained close behind her, fighting off a few humans close on their tails until they breached the water like great whales and took to the skies, swimming in the same way as Amun in his Imp form while their pursuers looked helplessly from the surface. On another, we saw the smaller girl, Iris, dragging another massive human through the air as she flew through some unseen force I knew not she had. And then there was the Death Jarl.
Zaraxus effortlessly guided his blade through all eighty royal guards, rendering them wilted corpses with the most shallow of cuts as he made a path towards the rulers of Shujen's surface and the esteemed warriors guarding them. Once there, he tossed his weapon aside and proceeded to crush skulls, rip limbs, pry hearts, and tear flesh while the decrepit king and the withered queen looked on in horror.
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When all that was left was them and the new king, Zaraxus tossed the former rulers aside and stepped back after placing an item on the royal dais. His shrunken lair, once reduced to the shape of a ring, then expanded to form his new lair. Rather than watch it take shape, however, he kicked and tossed the King and Queen to the side of every group of fallen guards so they could watch them be born anew. Then, with a company of new draugr ranked and filed behind him, they marched to the edge of that final standing wall and stepped over it.
There was no crash when they landed. Only a gentle breeze coupled with a short march to Amun's side, wherein the former rulers were forced to their knees and the Death Jarl leaned back on his heels to bellow a victorious roar across the city.
While the roar forced their wide eyes deeper into the ground, they hoped and quietly pleaded for their worthless lives to be spared. However, Amun's eyes turned to the sky. Seconds passed; long seconds of sobbing shivers, howling winds, and shifting flesh. Then… screaming. A scream of sheer terror echoed from the skies like the call of a predatory bird. Only, the birds were shaped like humans, and their prey was a pair of humans more than twice their size.
They threw them like trash, sending them hurdling to the ground, but Amun cast a quick spell that lessened their speed, leaving them dangling in the air at his sides. They seemed young. Several years younger than me and Amun but a few years older than the girls, if barely. Siblings, undoubtedly. Born with the same broad, brutish faces and snarling eyes that bore holes at the beings that could only be their parents.
"Why!?" Blude landed in a fire of red hair and white snow. "Why?" She repeated, screaming as she stalked to the king and queen, only to face about towards those hiding in their homes. "What did we do? Why did you keep attacking us? Him?" She pointed towards the Elven Devil, shocking us all; me, Matron Etyl, and even the enraged siblings and their parents.
'What a reaction. How naive.' I silently mused, looking over the others as I did so. There was a shock in their eyes, of course. But to varying degrees, and far less than there should have been. But… there was also anger. Disbelief. Not at Amun, but the barbarians. Yet, there was also humility, awe, and sadness written on their faces.
"Many creatures tend to react to things that are different- to the unknown, with violence. That is not a trait exclusive to humanity. Humans only act on those impulses the most." Amun began in an almost solemn tone. "It is through no fault of their own, however. Such things are born naturally from a reality as harsh as ours. One where interacting with the unknown often warrants death. We become what this reality- what our environments and experiences, make us. The things that make us become the most familiar thing. The paradigm. The status quo. The thing that must be protected at all costs. And so, that which brings change is that which is opposed with the most fervor; for that threatens to remove the comforts of familiarity the most.
"Like those in Bakewia." He gestured to the distance. "Some can see past what's on the outside and give the unknown a chance, though the journey to do so is long. They are the ones who embrace the changing tides. Many others cannot." Amun sighed heavily, looking at the sphere of death floating above. "They are the ones who label those who are different, those with cultures or beliefs unaligned with their own, as evil. Monstrosities. Abominations. They are the ones who become broken when they lose those familiar things.
"Those are the ones who hold the weights of good and evil with such ardor that the scale tips off the fulcrum. They become so convinced of living in the good light that they fail to realize they've plunged into the wicked night. Isn't that right, my dear King Horas, Queen Frahna?"
Amun leaning forward must have empowered the former rulers, for the King glared and the Queen spat at Amun, who merely laughed at the display before stepping aside to display their progeny.
"Let this be your first lesson from me," Amun said. "Some people in these realms will seek to destroy all you know and love, simply because you exist. Simply because you've affiliated yourselves with me."
"I know that already," Blude muttered, seemingly embarrassed.
"I was talking to them." Amun clarified, staring at the two hulking siblings.
<<"What, are you to be their guardian as well?">> High Matron Etyl spat in disgust.
"I am, but only as a means to an end." He nodded distantly, much to my abject surprise. "The girl was a sickly child, despite her strength and size. So, her father, Horas, here, thought it best to throw her into the wilds to grow strong. In a crass way, it worked." He snorted out a laugh. "She survived by sneaking cattle away from farms and offering them to the wolves to gain their trust. That caught my interest. The boy was deemed weak for showing kindness to animals and only killing when needed. Thus he was tortured and punished daily by his mother dearest, Frahna." He looked at me during his short but meaningful pause, and I felt my heart freeze as he continued past the girls and the siblings.
"Of all the voices in the Bodhi Peninsula, pleading to Mani, yours were the loudest, the most selfless, and the ones I'll get along with the best. And so, I am here to grant your wish. I am here to free you; to teach and train you. I am here to bring you into my adventuring party, the Elven Devil’s Troupe. We will roam the realms together for centuries and on through the millennia. However." Amun stepped towards the siblings before any of us, even High Matron Etyl, could speak. "As per the Rules of Death, Parricide or the killing of any blood-related kin is taboo. Doing so will forever taint your soul. You'll be cursed regardless of my input.
"Now, I couldn't care less if you're cursed or blessed or living or dead, it's all the same to me, but this isn't about me." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder, towards the King and Queen and the celestial wolves, reduced to puppies. "Skoll and Hati have been eyeing you since the start of the year. They've taken a liking to you. Simultaneously, they wish to become something greater in death. They wish for you to as well. Not like this, though. They don't want you to kill your parents, so they've decided to kill them for you. In other words, if you truly want to kill your parents, you'll have to murder Skoll and Hati first; murder, because they refuse to fight you.
"Now." Amun laughed in a way that was not funny. "I care deeply about these wolves. I've known them for nearly a decade and I'm only sixteen. So, if you kill them, I'll not only curse you and your descendants for eternity, but you will replace them on my journey across the Mortal Plane and your parents will haunt you. Do with that information what you will."
Their eyes fell as one, flicked between endless points on the ground as one, then rose to pour dissimilar motions into the crisp breeze; first, despair. "You will let them live!??" the boy sank, his face a broken mess of emotions hidden beneath his blonde hair while the girl thrashed in silence.
"Not so." Amun shook his head with the calm indifference of a great wrym before a novice adventurer. "As I said, Skoll and Hati will kill them. I will then raise them as undead and put them in charge of the city as they once were. Only... better."
"Over my dead body!" The girl growled.
Amun mirrored her malice with a cold smirk and a snarky laugh as he threw an axe and a bow on the ground. "That can be arranged. So walk the walk."
With those words, the gathered undead formed a ring around the twins and their progenitors, but not much happened for minutes. Until that is, the King and Queen grew encouraged enough to begin throwing insults at their children. The usual ones humans would use. Coward. Weakling. Justifications for their 'cruelties' using the claim that it was to forge them into strong, suitable rulers or that it was once done to them as hidden traditions, but they were disappointments. Unimaginative, but effective.
The girl moved first, exclaiming that if they would be cursed either way, it would be better to get the satisfaction of revenge. Yet, her body jerked and swayed with unease as she loosed arrow after arrow into the white wolf, who grew in size to shield her father until it fell minutes later, and her father soon after.
That made the Queen laugh at the weakness of her son. A weakness that was so much greater than his frail sister's. A weakness pointed out further as his axe blade pointed her way, only for a mass of black fur to stand on her chest and crush the words from her lungs. The massive blow nearly missed the black wolf entirely. It only sliced through the throat and veins of the neck, leaving enough force to cleave through the Queen's ribs, silencing her forever and the wolf forever.
"How fucking dare you."
The words banged against reality like thunder echoing from a realm of perpetual storms; or rather, from a storm that was contained in the shape of a drow-devil, giving the being a glow of silver-blue light that belied the wicked words steaming from his abyssal tongue.
With a rise of his hand and a stream of curses in that foul, devilish language, the souls of the departed wolves clambered from their corpses to flex and yawn in the divine light before they dashed toward the siblings, flowing into their bodies as I would mine when returning from a projection. Only, they thrashed. They seized. They writhed in ways that made the martial undead seem as if they were dancing when they were first raised.
My morbid mind was utterly fascinated. Bones shifted and cracked in the most unnatural ways as their arms elongated, darkened, or brightened, and lit up with tribal markings along their chests. As their fingers and toes elongated into claws, their mouths followed, stretching into snouts that released animalistic groans to echo through the hearts of those watching through their windows, pushing them deeper inside to hide behind growing barricades of furniture. The exclamations of disgust, curiosity, and shock from those who watched on faded once Amun's curses ran dry. Yet the changes to the twins' bodies continued as the black and white tufts of fur on their new marks spread across their malformed bodies, forming billowing manes of fur as they finally reared back with a howl, and pounced.
A heaping pile of raw meat that was not there before was the victim of their frenzied hunger. They devoured the carnivorous feast in mere gut-wrenching moments, leaving the massive wolf-humans surprisingly calm, if not jumpy. Their eyes of ice and fire darted everywhere as Amun approached with a few soft words and that divine silver light of his, calming their breathing and shedding their fur into clouds of ashen dust and snowy mist that blew away to reveal the human twins sleeping peacefully in the snow as if nothing happened.