Itakar

Selene had never met a Sprout that was as courageous and as stupid as the one in front of her. He clearly couldn’t beat them all. If he didn’t see the wisdom in surrendering, then whatever happened to him was his cup to bear. She watched as he tore through the air, evading the arrows that were shot at him. To her surprise, he sped toward another Sprout so fast her eyes could not follow his movement.

Selene walked backward, out of the firing range of her archers while smiling at him. No matter what he did, his fate had already been sealed. Her smile brightened as he looked her way, expecting him to realize what a grave mistake he had made at the last moment before his death but the Sprout just smiled back at her.

More than a dozen arrows tore through the air, their pointed tips aimed at him but he just stood there. The next moment though Selene’s jaw dropped to the floor.

She watched, awestruck as the Sprout was instantly covered in metal armor that repelled all the arrows. He extended a metal whip from his left hand. Selene’s brows rose in surprise as recognition hit her like a brick wall.

“Jerome, stop!” she shouted but he had already lashed out with the whip. Her eyes were drawn to the glowing tip of the whip that zoomed behind him and struck the top of the boulder.

The top of the boulder shattered with a loud bang and Trudhorn, who was about to attack Jerome from atop the boulder, was sent flying into the distance. The debris from the explosion scattered in all directions, saturating the air with dust.

“Jerome, wait,” Selene said, raising her hands in the air. “Stop, all of you. Stop!” she barked at her teammates.

“Let’s take this guy down, Selene. Who the fuck does he think he is?” Ajax growled angrily, drawing his bow.

“I know you don’t know me, but I know you,” she said looking at the armor-clad Jerome. He looked like a battle-hardened warrior in his metallic-red armor. She could perceive a slight tang of blood coming from his armor and it made her feel like he’d probably killed a lot of people and drained their blood with the flowing steel gauntlets.

“Oh, I know you,” Jerome said, “And trust me, the Sovereign…” he pointed a blade that materialized in his hand at some point at those in his view, “...is the reason many of you are still standing without broken body parts.”

Ajax shivered at that. He slowly lowered his bow as did all the others. Jerome retracted his armor and turned around. Selene and her teammates all watched, mesmerized as metallic-red liquid steel flowed around his body. It slowed down and immediately transformed into a set of wings on his back ready for flight.

“Stay, Jerome,” Selene said.

“You do not tell me what to do,” he responded in a cold and strained voice as if anger was simmering below the surface.

“Please. Please stay.”

“Fuck this!” Ajax growled, regaining his wits. “He’s gonna have to prove he can stand with us.” Then he turned to Jerome. “Your gauntlets aren’t enough to scare me, little brat.” A long sword materialized in his hand immediately. The shiny sword looked out of place amidst his dirt-laden, stinky armor.

“What are you doing, Ajax?” Selene demanded. “Stop this right now!”

“Ye should listen to yer sister, mate,” someone said, and the group of Sprouts chortled loudly. Many of them relaxed at that and Selene felt the tension in the air ebb.

“The boy’s intense, mate,” another said. “He’s gon’ hand yer arse to ye.” More laughter.

“What is he, sixteen?” Ajax said, twirling his shiny sword in his right hand, showing off. “I bet I can take him with my eyes closed.”

Selene looked over at Jerome hoping he wouldn’t take the insult to heart but Jerome only tilted his head smiling, his gaze never leaving her brother.

“Well, he beat Alvric to a pulp when he was just twelve. I can imagine what he’d do to you now that he’s Sprout,” Trudhorn said as he popped out of the side of the boulder.

“Where’d ye run off to?” Nia asked as she saw him. She was looking better now, though signs of her injuries still showed on her shoulder.

Trudhorn raised a hand at her as he sighed and slumped down against the boulder to catch his breath.

~~~

“Leave him be,” Jerome said smiling, “Perhaps he wants to prove himself.” He felt like he understood the Sprout. He wanted to prove himself to his teammates, to himself … maybe to his sister. Ajax reddened in embarrassment and Jerome’s lips couldn’t help but curl upward. He too was once like that — perhaps he still is.

Jerome observed the Sprout with his short silver-white locks. His hair and eyes gave him a different kind of presence, just like his sister — white air and ice blue irises. No one else on their team had hair like that. Still, the few blonde heads of hair were also hard to look away from. Their teammates also had blue eyes of varying shades.

“A tale as old as ale,” Selene said with a shrug, standing with arms akimbo. Her stained silver-white hair, a stark contrast to the dark armor she was wearing. The fire in the center of the camp chased away the shadows from her form. The rest of the Sprouts laughed loudly.

Jerome looked around at the Sprouts, seeing the similarities between them and Abbott and his men — Kilian’s guards. He was starting to like them. They didn’t carry themselves high and mighty like the Royals and they didn’t look down on others, which told a lot about their mentality.

“Very well,” he said, spinning his spear in fast circles behind him with one hand. The odd movement of the spear generated a lot of wind which attracted weird looks from the Sprouts around. At this point he had retracted the flowing steel into his body. “Let’s see what you got.”

“Ahem. Did I mention we’d soon come under attack?” Trudhorn’s voice cut through the air, halting everyone in place.

“How many,” Selene said, already pulling out her bow and a quiver of arrows from her storage ring.

“Thirty in front. Maybe more.”

The team of Sprouts took action immediately, taking positions and aiming into the distance, Jerome and Ajax’s fight forgotten. Jerome jumped on top of the boulder and also looked into the distance. The creatures racing toward them were exactly thirty in front a few dozen yards away, but there were more behind them.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“The Children must have been attracted by the explosion from before,” Selene said, walking towards him. The top of the boulder had been blown clean off, leaving a nearly flat surface. She inspected the surface, surprised at the level of damage done.

“Is that what they’re called?” Jerome asked as he went down on one knee.

“Children of the Mother,” she said, nodding.

Jerome paused to look at her. “...the Mother?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. “What does that mean?”

Selene took a deep breath and exhaled. The air was cool and fresh, infused with the unique scent of earth and wood. But the forest was quiet, awaiting the battle that was to come.

“It wasn’t explained to me too in detail,” she said. “Some books insinuate that the ‘Mother’ is Mother Nature, some say it’s something else.”

“But what did the Matriarch say about it?” Jerome asked insistently.

Selene looked away unwilling to give an answer. Jerome’s unblinking gaze remained on her for a few breaths before he spoke again. “Some of them have mid-ranged weapons — spikes laced with poison. Be careful.” Hopefully their arrows would keep the Children at a distance.

As the stampede of the Children approached, the earth began to tremble beneath their feet. Jerome noticed that every Sprout around him was poised with their bows drawn in focused readiness. Surveying the scene, he couldn’t help but imagine that this could have been him and his friends fighting side by side. He remembered their faces — Doti, Dreamer, and Whisper; and the many children from the orphanage.

Jerome took a deep breath and exhaled, bringing his focus to the present moment. The tension in the air was high — almost palpable. Everyone was on edge waiting for the battle to begin. The Children soon ran into their shooting range and with a word from Selene, the Sprouts let loose a rain of arrows upon them.

~~~

Alvric

The attacks never stopped. The Children just kept bombarding them, unwilling to let them move forward, even at the expense of their own lives. Why not? They were puppets, there to do their Mother’s bidding.

Hedon plunged his sword into one of the Children attacking him and jumped backward to evade the clawed hand of another. His hands were going numb already. He couldn’t remember how many he had killed. Thankfully they weren’t surrounded and had made it close to the exit of the mine already.

A Sprout next to him sliced upward with her sword and the Child battling with her screamed. She kicked it in the gut and shot a ball of air at it. The Child stumbled into the others behind it giving him and his team enough chance to back up. However, the Children stomped on themselves to reach the team, not caring for their kind.

This was the fifth cave they had searched for his grandfather’s damned treasure. He had already lost three Sprouts searching for the treasure.

“Watch out for those with bladed arms!” someone screamed. The tunnel they were in was wide enough for four people to stand side by side and narrow enough that the Children couldn’t surround them. They edged closer to the exit, step by step, blocking and dodging claws and bladed arms. But they were not moving as fast as Hedon wanted.

He quickly stepped to the side as another Child attacked him. He ducked as the Child’s clawed hand aimed for his head. Hedon concentrated wind essence on his blade and slashed at the arm of the Child. The Child screamed in pain as its limb was almost separated from its body.

“Fucking sturdy bastards!” he cursed. The bones of these creatures were sturdier than some metals on their plane. The stench of their blood, however, could choke a full-grown magic beast to death.

“Retreat!” he screamed. Hopefully, he hadn’t lost anyone here today.

They gathered wind essence at their feet and when they saw an opening, shot backward at full speed. The Children pursued, gaining on them easily. The space in the tunnel was too narrow for all of them to speed out at once.

Team Alvric slowed down once more. Backing up slowly out of the mine, shoving back the Children with their wind essence, and killing those that came too close. It took a lot of time for them to get to the exit before they took to the skies, fleeing as fast as they could.

“We lost another brother, Hedon,” someone said as they flew through the sky. “Did the Patriarch not tell you what we’re looking for?”

Hedon shook his head. “He only said it would make the Argonaut more powerful. And to bring it back at all cost.”

“At all cost,” another person said, glaring at Hedon with hate-filled eyes. “And how much cost are we to bear for this?”

The whole team went silent at that. Nobody wanted to go against the instructions of the Patriarch. They didn’t like it, but they could do nothing about it. They landed on a rocky hill and decided to rest there for the time being.

“Arkesha,” Hedon called out. “You’re on the first watch. The rest of you should get some rest. We’re going to need all our strength if we’re to survive out here.

“Trust me, I don’t like it any more than you do. But it is what we have to do. We mourn our fallen when we get home.”

With that he found a spot for himself and flicked a finger to bring out his tent from his ring — in an already prepared state. No need to start fixing it up. Hedon chuckled, entering the large, gray tent to find the bare minimum of luxuries he’d need to take care of himself throughout his stay in Terra Praeta.

“Not much,” he said looking around. “But it’ll do.” The inside of the tent was larger than it appeared on the outside — a result of an artificer’s efforts no doubt. A small tub filled with water sat adjacent to the entrance and a big bed took up the space opposite it. Perhaps his time in Terra Praeta could still be enjoyable. He smiled as he undressed himself, thinking of the few females he had in the group.

The rest of the team shuffled about before their new camp settled in silence again. It was going to be a long night. One that probably never ended. They just had to find his grandfather’s treasure — if there was a treasure to begin with. He frowned, and his anger rose as he thought about the Sprouts he had lost searching for the damned treasure. It felt like an impossible task. They had been searching for heaven knows how long but hadn’t been able to find the treasure.

And then there was the night that never ended. How the hell were they supposed to find daylight without anything as a guide? He closed his eyes in frustration, settling into the tub to wash. They’d figure it out as they went along. Hopefully, they wouldn’t lose too many Sprouts.

~~~

The whole camp had descended into chaos. Yet, amidst the pandemonium, the Itakars held themselves together. Hence, giving him the chance to unleash the true power of visha stirh’aun upon the Children. He emerged from the shadows like a vengeful deity, adorned in armor glinting with the crimson tint of blood that told of past battles — at least that was how he thought of himself in the moment.

With each swing of his spear, he tore through the Children, leaving a trail of devastation in his wake.

Every now and then, an unfortunate Child was struck with the tip of his whip and a flash of blue light lit up the night followed by a loud bang. At least, he was able to provide enough light for the Itakars not to strike him.

The Children stormed toward him in a stampede, trying to overwhelm him with their numbers, but the flowing steel tore through their ranks. Bodies dropped like flies around him and once in a while, he could hear an arrow or two whiz past him.

Five Children attacked him from behind intending to catch him off guard but Jerome spun around and stabbed one of them, headbutting another with sharp blade-like points on his helmet. His helmet and armor changed form every so often, so as to cause the maximum amount of damage.

One of the Children grabbed his arm and Suzie flowed onto its hand ripping it to shreds. The Child roared in pain but its head was taken off mid-roar. Jerome swung his spear taking off three more heads at once. He spun his spear in the same motion and sliced the last Child from top to bottom, shattering bone along the path of the spear.

He quickly turned around to stab another but an arrow pierced through the back of its head and came out of its mouth as it froze over. Jerome shattered its remains. He stretched his hand and whipped to the side and another Child exploded in a storm of blood and guts.

Jerome walked forward taking in the scene around him. It felt like he was in a nightmare and yet he was oddly calm. Like he belonged here, on the battlefield. Bodies were stacked on top of each other, many of which had lost a good amount of their parts. Limbs and organs littered the ground and trees. A black eye, held by a strip of flesh from a tree branch stared into empty space as he passed by.

He shifted his gaze to the distant trees from where more Children were advancing. Jerome stopped to calm his racing heart and breathed in the air. The air was filled with the stench of the Children, but it did not deter him from doing what he needed to do — recite his mantra.