Kal staggered over the corpses of the enemy guards, his limbs snapping back into place as he seethed with disgust at their presence within his home.
Beneath he could sense the presence of others, so he willed his shell down the blood-soaked halls and to the staircase leading to the wine cellar. Some of the enemy was already screaming, their words fell upon deaf ears however as he slew all he tried to flee. Some unarmored weaklings were dead already, slain by the unrightful killers.
They did not matter, nothing mattered. All would die in the end. The wine cellar was larger than most, mainly because it had an adjoining mine shaft that his father used as a sort of display for minerals that he liked the look of. A pointless hobby when it would soon all be made dust.
The living enemy had attempted to hide, as they should but they would die like the rest. His flames spread across the room as he weaved amongst the standing corpses, his body not fast or strong but instead relentless. He would happily break himself to mangle in return, he would bleed to gore, burn to incinerate.
As the defiant fell to the inevitable, others went by their own hand, as they should. It is the only way to be spared his wrath.
Most of the standing had fallen like the rest. But three remained, there will unlike the rest. Kal paused in confusion as he looked over the anomalies. Were they broken? The first’s will flickered pathetically but unlike the rest held no hatred, no will to kill. Only fear. The second’s was a pale thing, hatred, but not for him. The last shined crimson like the rest but through that vile killing intent shined a tendril of bright gold its presence felt familiar, like an old enemy drawing his blade.
The second cried out, “Gods! Kalum, what’s happened to you?”
The first cried out words that he did not care to comprehend. They were simply the cries of corpses.
The third roared as several lights began to appear around the room, each morphing into lances of golden light, “A demon?! Here?! How?”
The third backed away and with a flick of his fingers, the lances shot through the room and pierced through Kal’s body. Blood sprayed and the other corpses cried out, “Kalum!, No! I will kill you!”
The lances vanished a moment later making his body fall. But his inevitable will twisted his form and sent him forward. The enemy gasped, “What are you?!” Kal could feel the twisting of the air as more lances came into being as his form shifted forward. More struck, leaving chunks of shell behind.
Before he could reach the golden corpse it had fled, its form merging with a beam of light which pierced through the floor and ceiling above. He sensed the will moving quickly away but stopped just as suddenly, returning to normal.
Kal followed his wrath burning his shell to exert all its pathetic strength to leap through the ceiling. Now on the edge, the enemy was in sight. It had not fled as he had expected but was now standing in the courtyard as above black clouds began to gather. The corpse was speaking.
“-for the light of the lord of conquest and control, I call upon his might to banish the fallen of the first to the abyss of their own making.” its hand dropped and a bolt of golden light slammed into Kal’s chest.
The standing corpse smiled as the spell landed, but after a moment his face turned ashen, and began to back away. Kal felt nothing at all.
“What, what are you?!”
Kal did not smile or even blink as his shell leaped from the rooftop down into the courtyard. Several more lances pierced his form but nothing was enough to slow him down. His barely functional sword pierced the corpse's chest and his free hand snapped to its neck and began to squeeze, “I am the slayer, the breaker, the ender. I am he who kills, and I am ~~~~~~~”
As the last words left his mouth the man’s eyes widened in terror and his will left him. Kal abandoned the sword in the corpse's chest and turned at the sound of the next corpse in his path. He turned to see the second broken will and began to walk towards the next end.
“No Kal! Stop! It’s me, your dad. No!”
Kal staggered as the sea of gore arose in his mind once more. The symbol on his neck pulsed, feeding tendrils of various manas into his mind. “What did I do?” he roared as a crimson flame burst from his core with a mind of its own, spreading across his body and the terrain all around him.
The voice of the shadow came to him on the wind from wherever it was hiding, “My abilities require me to place a mark on my target. Can you imagine how surprised I was to see that you were already marked and changed?”
Kal fell to his knees, his weapons forgotten as his mind shook. He could barely comprehend what the shadow was saying. All he could hear and see was the dream he had after fighting that mud ghoul.
An infinite plane of perfect gray spread out before Kal. Only one thing marred the strange gray, a small red figure ran into the distance. But Kal did not lose sight of it, its red skin shined, burning into his vision. He hated that fleeing light.
The hated light spun to beg as he went for the kill. To bring about the perfect end, all lights must be extinguished.
Kal gagged at the revelation. What had he done? No, No! His father was alive. He had seen him a few times early on after being moved out right? No, he couldn’t be dead. What about Lillian? She was still studying to be a merchant, or was she dead too?
“Get out of my head!” Kal roared, his birthright rising in time with his own rage.
The shadow snickered, “Oh but don’t you want to remember mortal? I am just undoing what another has done to you.”
Kal tried to combat the constant injections of mana through the symbol on his neck. How hadn’t he noticed it before? He had inspected his entire body with his internal sight several times by this point but not once had he spotted anything like the symbol that was now there.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
The reason became apparent as another infusion of shadow mana came through and Kal noticed the symbol degrade slightly, its glow intensifying as important structures were burned away- A sea of endless death greeted his return, as the ~~~~~~~~ slowly moved through the lifeblood of all, “Welcome, -
Kal came back to himself lying face down on the ground. Blood had begun to pour from his ears as a continuous onslaught of shadow mana was being injected through the symbol. To his side, he could see the seeker's shadow standing there without concealing itself at all its mouth agape, “How! It's you. No! No! NO!”
The world spun as Kal was bombarded with illusions once more and his mind faltered at the visions that kept flashing through his mind. He tried to resist- He lay across cold stone- he needed to find a way to stop this- He wailed as light pierced his tiny body- he didn’t have anywhere to focus his will before but now that he could see the symbol- “You will be my avatar, a puppet.”- Kal encompassed his will around the symbol and crushed it with all his mental might.
Suddenly the world stood still, the illusions completely cut off. Kal’s mind still raced with the images that he had seen but he activated Wrath Incarnate and let it all fall into the uncaring pit of his wrath and die.
He stood and saw that the shadow was frozen in place, its mouth agape, “Please, I will serve. Your wrath is pure Great One.” It even tried to kneel down and beg. Pathetic. When he said nothing and approached the shadow tried to run but without its illusions. It was not nearly as fast as he had originally thought.
Kal simply leaped towards it using his strength instead of his agility to propel him. He snatched the pathetic thing up by its neck and squeezed. Its endurance was of course as weak as he expected, several bones immediately cracked under the pressure.
The shadow struggled but it was hopeless its strength was nothing compared to his, “You were supposed to be ours.”
Kal ignored it as he continued to crush its neck, it kept looking down at hand so he grabbed hold of it and looked at it himself as the demon continued to struggle. There was a black ring on its finger, Kal careless of whatever the ring was for simply tore the demon's arm off and threw it several feet away.
That was when the demon truly began to struggle. It tried to scream but Kal let nothing through his iron grip.
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Kiriax struggled as the monster slowly choked the life out of him. He should not have drawn the fight out like he had but the mortal’s strange skill had made him act irrationally. But how could he have known it was Him?
He needed to tell his master. The Great Seeker would happily destroy this plane to get a hold of this monster. Kiriax just needed to wait for the ring to activate so he could escape this damned trial.
The mortal’s mark continued to manipulate his emotions, pushing him to kill. Just like what was foretold.
Kiriax watched his health ticked down faster than he had expected then looked at the ring that would be his salvation. Then the mortal grabbed his hand, No! An instant later his arm was torn free like wet paper. Kiriax tried to scream as he felt the ring un-attune. In pained horror, he looked into the mortal’s uncaring eyes as the grip around his next tightened further.
The mortal’s expression didn’t change but through its mark, Kiriax felt its wrath flare before it brought its other hand to bear.
*crack*
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Tearing the shadow head free required almost no effort. What a pointless pathetic creature, it tormented when it should have gone for the kill. A trait that all demons seemed to share in this disgusting plane.
You have slain [Seeker Shadow | Abyss Spawn 64] bonus experience rewarded for slaying a higher leveled entity.
Level up!
Level up!
Careless of the sudden bombardment of notifications Kal threw the rest of the headless shadow’s corpse to the side and paced, his breathing heavy as even while his Wrath Incarnate was active he was still receiving an onslaught of visions and memories.
They meant nothing to him in his better state but it would hamper his abilities the moment he deactivated the skill. Pathetic. But he had no choice as his wrath continued to drop. Any moment he would be burning stamina to keep the skill active.
With a growl, Kal ended Wrath Incarnate, and the full emotional impact of all the visions he witnessed returned. He staggered as horrible images of his father torn apart with his own hands, “Blood, so much blood… What happened, father? No, it can’t be true.”
Kal looked inside himself and found what he had hoped would vanish the moment the shadow died. The symbol was still there, glowing slightly as it degraded. Crushing it with his will had done nothing to the symbol's structure. It was actually a construct but it seemed stylized somehow, almost like an artist had added some engraving to a complicated instrument. It was in those flairs that Kal saw the familiarity with the runes he saw in Mara’s bunker.
“Fyborh? Why would he have done this?”
In the nightmare he had while touching the second remembrance stone Kal had heard Fyborh speak to him. Something about trying to put him back together. But how had he even known about Kal? What the fuck was going on.
But what did the symbol do? Was it manipulating him? Or was it supposed to help him? The shadow had nearly managed to defeat him by taking advantage of it. Just the thought of something manipulating his mind made Kal want to kill something, he even thought about trying to rip the thing out of his neck but he had no idea what it could do to him.
He needed time to think this through and start working on his mind and skills. He opened up his notifications as he took a seat trying to steady his mind.
Trial of the Slayer I
Wave: 2
Time: 17 days, 5 hours, 11 minutes, 32 seconds
The Lords of this layer have become aware of your presence and have allied their forces with the Bestial Lord. Show them that a slayer cares not what enemy they face.
Alterations: Difficulty significantly increased, Time trial: Enemies will be allowed to enter the area of the trial for duration with no limit.
Warning: Several lords of the first layer have detected anomalous mana from this trial and have sent their forces to intervene in the trial. However, the lords do not have a sanctioned conduit under their control and have been forced to power their own, limiting the forces they can field inside the trial to numbers equivalent in strength to the bestial lord’s horde. Difficulty of trial has increased significantly.
Reward: Legendary Skill, Uncommon Chest x 2, Extra Class Upgrade Benefit
Optional Objective: Slay the Elite
Slay the anchor of each conduit in the trial zone. Reward given for each anchor slain.
Felflame Scion: 0/1
Gorefiend Butcher: 0/1
Seeker Shadow: 1/1
Kuroxet Bonedrinker: 0/1
Reward: Temporary Haven