A noxious green mist, thick and cloying, erupted out of the Augur as spears of white death screamed towards it. In a split second, luminiscent green fumes covered the battlefield, the Augur disappearing into the sickly haze. Thunderclaps signified the spears had reached earth.
Yuri seemed unperturbed, waving her hand once made 20 of the spears drop in a circle around her, warding her and the Xeral from the corrosive fumes. Her eyes glowed a darker shade of red as she sought out her prey. Without warning, she stepped to the side as the ground beside her exploded. The dust cleared to reveal a large bone scythe embedded into the ground, curved and serrated, its handle connected to a chain that extended above.
The Augur yanked the chain, the scythe cleaving the ground like wet paper heading towards the Princess. She side-stepped it deftly, her movements hardly visible to the Xeral. The scythe returned back to the Augur's hand, unable to find its target. The Augur quickly retreated into the mist, Yuri's eyes narrowed. Plasma crept up her body from her toes, like liquid armor, it encased every inch of her body. The living thunderbolt then flashed inside the mists in hot pursuit of her quarry.
Sounds of battle, distant and dream-like, echoed through the ghastly landscape. Sounds of weapons and thunderclaps reached the Xeral's ears, although faintly, as though they were underwater. An uneasy silence followed.
A white lance seared into the Xeral's eyes, blinding him. Grunting in pain, he doubled over, waiting for the dots in his vision to recede. A few moments later, he gingerly opened his eyes to find the mist dispersing and to see a pillar of light piercing the skies. A tower of pure energy with no end in sight seemed to reach for the bloody gash that painted the horizons. "Princess of the Burning Skies indeed," muttered the Xeral.
His Master landed gently in front of him. She held her hand out, her fingers holding a fibrous cluster of roots shaped vaguely like a heart. The Xeral took it wordlessly, biting into it. A palpable expression of relief crossed his face. He got up to his feet, seemingly with little effort, as he wolfed down the rest of the strange plant matter. His eyes found a large arm clad in white bone smoking some distance away.
"It got away," said Yuri, cold rage marring her face. "Are you alright?" she asked, rage morphing into concern.
"I was careless, Teacher. The Marrowrrot took care of the worst of it. I will be fine in a few hours," the Xeral replied.
"You are not ready to go after Augurs, O' idiot pupil of mine. Now, what do you know about that?" she asked, pointing to the skyborne phenomenon which seemed to be getting closer somehow, primordial energies crackling at the edges of the gargantuan spatial rip.
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"A hooded creature mentioned something about a voyager. The Forlorn Deities have worked a Summoning, I was told. It also said the reason we didn't know was because someone or something stopped the FarSought's sight," the Xeral replied.
Yuri raised her eyebrows. "Someone muddled Her vision? That is concerning," she said.
As if on cue, the air stilled. The spatial tear contracted as if folding in on itself, it was like watching a wounded titan heal itself in real time.
A symphony of reds contracted to a single point and exploded in a shockwave so huge that the powers of the world stopped their mysterious doings and turned towards the sky. The maelstrom they saw paled in comparison to the turmoil in their hearts. A time of great upheaval was upon this plane, and many millions would suffer in the coming days. The future was bleak and uncertain. The Void corridor vanished as if it had never existed, winking out behind the plane-shattering shockwave high in the sky.
Teacher and student watched intently, hoping to lay eyes on the plane that now called their home.
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Aaron had been falling for a long time. He didn't know if it had been days, weeks, or months. After he decided to end it all, he found an abandoned apartment complex that had never been built past its concrete skeleton and jumped off of it. The reprieve from stimuli that he had craved did not arrive. The pavement did not arrive. In fact, nothing seemed to have come. There was no light, no sounds, and no sense of direction. Just infinite black on all sides. He didn't know if he was floating or falling. After voiding the contents of his stomach within the first few minutes (or hours, who knows really?), and watching the bile and detritus disintegrate in front of his eyes, Aaron gulped and tears streamed from his eyes. He didn't know what sort of Lovecraftian horror would crawl out for snack time. He had always been afraid of the dark, ever since he was a kid. Sleeping with the light on as an adult warranted considerable heckling from his acquaintances. "Acquaintances, not friends," he thought miserably.
After an indeterminate amount of time, most of which was spent contemplating the nature of the fever dream he found himself in, Aaron saw a horizontal line of white getting bigger slowly. "So he was falling," he realized.
Before his mind could comprehend, he crossed the light and found himself looking down at a world of green. He imagined hearing a chuckle as he crossed over from the dark.
Cold! The wind was freezing, shearing into his body. His cotton shirt provided absolutely no respite as he free-fell onto what seemed to be an ocean of green.
Aaron screamed in terror as the green filled all of his vision now, regretting his decision to ever kill himself. Regret flashed inside his head over and over again. Until suddenly, the wind wasn't as harsh anymore. He opened his eyes out of reflex to find himself slowing down. He slowly touched down on knee-length grass, crumpling unceremoniously onto the waiting ground. He breathed in and out for what seemed like an eternity, until a face came into view - chocolate-colored with light brown eyes. This person was gazing at him with a terse expression. Aaron shifted around on instinct, trying to get back, and that was when he was horrified to find the presence of a sludge-like intrusion going "squish" within his pants. The dusky beauty crinkled her nose in disgust.