“No!” Dreixia cried from the parapet top, practically frothing at the mouth. She was incensed. “I won’t brook another piece of shit spiritual parasite sucking at the teat of our prowess ever again! Look what one did to us!” She cast her eyes out at the crowd as an appeal. “And where is he now?! He failed us and he is gone.”
The Naugites muttered and shifted uncomfortably, suddenly reminded of her prior, more salient capability for points like that.
Not bad. She has a bit of a point that shines through. Let’s see how long it lasts, though.
Puck showed not the slightest twitch in concern, her hands still out. She lowered them finally, to do a mock, ‘Hmmm....’ while scratching her chin. “Spiritual parasite? Why, that’s a Dominion phrase, isn’t it? Have you been reading their books, Dreixia?” Suddenly, she waved her hands and laughed merrily. “Bah, who am I kidding — the only things you read are X’s and O’s!”
This casual barb got some incredulous snickers and chuckles, along with looks like ‘Did someone just say that to Dreixia?!’ This final effect kept most silent.
Dreixia scowled balefully. “Of course I read! Sometimes- bah! It’s irrelevant! You bitchy runt!”
“You have done nothing but yell obscenities, and I’m the bitchy one? Your body is withering, your mind is spent, and your days are fading fast, while I thrive in vitality and clarity. And Zadkiel? Oh, my poor, dear fool, you are misinformed.” Her eyes swept over the other Naugites as she smirked knowingly.
She spun her staff and thrust it upward, where an explosion of light revealed a massive, grand vision warping and taking shape in the sky above. “He recovers in the dark of shadows! He builds strength with every passing hour! His will claws its way back to us!”
The vision showed a scarred Zadkiel covered in darkness, smoke wafting up from his body, holding a flaming two-handed sword point down, its cast light barely eating through the heaviness around him. One of his eyes had a nasty scar, but the other shined with a dull, shimmering power that ebbed slowly. More scars were occasionally hinted at on his barred chest.
In short, he looked super badass. Like something from an AAA game promo.
“Hot,” murmured a few voices from the crowd. The rest looked on in awe, spellbound and stunned.
Zadkiel, I’m doing you such a solid right now.
Puck continued in her epic voice. “Against the terrible corrupting will of the Great Sage, he fought…” The scene changed to one of Zadkiel screaming with his arms and legs bound and outward as magic lashed him, with a caricature of the ‘evil sage’ looming over him with a sadistic grin.
Then he made an audible warcry-like howl of “Freeeedoom!” that Sammy stole from the movie ‘Braveheart,’ and broke the bonds explosively to the disbelief of the sage. “He fought and resisted! For his people that needed him. For the noble blood he could not allow to forsake its purpose.”
A fight scene played out between Zadkiel and the sage, the latter using his flaming sword. It turned out maybe a bit too much like a corrupt Sith with force lighting going against a lightsaber-wielder for Sammy’s liking, but it was what she knew. “Depleted by his ordeals, drained by the despicable and unfair powers of the Great Sage, Zadkiel fought on with grit and mettle… however doomed his struggle might be.” The sage was shown to be getting the upper hand, scouring Zadkiel with… totally not force lightning.
The crowd was super absorbed by it. “No!” many lamented with stricken faces. Others shouted encouragement for the phantom Zadkiel. “Fight Back, Zaddy!” “You can do it!”
The image seemed to dim and grow darker along with Zadkiel’s hopes as he fell to one knee. Gasps resounded from the crowd.
“But… a Gleam of Hope arrived on the horizon.” A starburst flash much like had appeared in Puck’s eye appeared in the distance, and a beam of radiance shot across the distance to hit the sage right in the face, eliciting a scream. Sammy milked the scene to do a slow-motion panorama like something from the movie 300, highlighting the details surrounded by darkness. And a random Spartan.
Oops. Damn subconscious.
“Puck the Magnificent had come!” The camera then zoomed across the distance to show Puck in armor atop her dark pegasus, her arm and staff outstretched to fire that spooky magic beam. Flanking her were her dragons and ‘dark’ angels. “I’d sought him out in the Beyond, in the Distant Reaches, and his resistance pulled me so. So I joined it!”
The crowd erupted in victorious cheer, though it quieted down quickly as the vision continued. A struggle ensued, with the powerful sage fighting back against them both and more than holding his own. Though he took shot after shot, he destroyed or disabled dragons and angels with every flinging hand of entropic spellcraft. He gained ground and began to seize the advantage.
“Even the two of us were not enough to defeat him. However… I was not the only one to conspire for his freedom.” Amidst the darkness, tufts of plants and flowers erupted from new soil, and then trees grew — taller and taller and taller. The trees became figures of great stature, and the greatest of all extended its hand as a closed fist. It opened to reveal a beautiful cluster of varied blooms. At the center rose the Goddess of Nature, Redberry. Resplendent, glorious… and free of blight.
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The crowd of Naugites gasped in shock and wonder as Redberry entered the fight along with her titanic treants, which spawned out their own dryads in an endless horde. These forces combined dealt terrible wounds to the Great Sage, who could no longer muster counterattacks in the midst of such a blitzkrieg. He was driven back and back and ultimately forced to retreat.
It was then that the crowd exploded in cheer at the victory. Names intermingled — Puck, Redberry, Zadkiel. And the word ‘alliance’ was a whisper that took off like a storm. “An alliance of gods!” Excitement was palpable.
The scene above shifted to show the three standing together on a hill, striking super cool poses. Puck held it there as she spoke. “My spiritual mother cultivated me in secret! Secret lands of your chaotic south to birth a special power. That power is Pandemonium! Dark to match the horror she suffered, light to match her desire for the world. So it is twisted and mingled in me. I am one and both, I am the Bridge of Tomorrow, I am she who recreates out of nothingness and destruction! With Redberry, with Zadkiel, together we’ll forge a unified strength that has never been matched. That cannot be matched.”
The vision finally dissipated. The crowd grew more sober and silent as they calmed and gazed at her.
“Poppycock!” Dreixia. Of course. “Poppycock and bullshit!” She laughed, bitter and derisive, sneering all the while. “My clansfolk will not listen to this drivel. You cast illusions and lie through your pretty teeth! You put on a nice show, no doubt. But where’s the proof of your claims?”
The crowd of Naugites was not terribly happy with her commentary, but they nonetheless shifted uncomfortably. What they wanted to believe was at odds with their loyalties.
Before Puck could respond, a distorted yet resounding voice exclaimed, “All she says is true!” From a corner, Naugites gave way in alarm as a bundle of shadows expanded to form into a figure perhaps taller than Dreixia, though thinner. When it took on definition, it became an armored, beautiful blue demoness holding a spear. Sammy was shocked when she realized it was Ba Ra.
“All she says has happened,” Ba Ra murmured passionately to the crowd and thrust up her spear. “So speaks Ba-Rasine, High Servitor Priestess of Zadkiel! The news is fresh, my fellows, but hope rings in the air. Hope to the tune of a restored Redberry, a restoring Zadkiel, and the wielder of incredible, mysterious powers fit to be our edge of glory, Puck the Magnificent! All hail Puck, our new goddess and ally!”
Dreixia did not let the crowd take it up this time. She slammed the butt of her flail staff into the stone multiple times, making almost everyone cover their ears in pain. “I care not! A! Whit!” — she slammed her flail with each word — “What some slave girl slut of Zadkiel says about anything! Your butt clapper is not my clan’s deity. None of you are Naugite deities! How long did we go without your infection? Your lies? My ancestors hunted them like any other monster. A slaying hero was as much of a god as we ever needed!”
Her eyes dropped as her hand shook from the grip she had on her weapon. “If only the same had happened to that shithead upstart before… before I…” She trailed off, appearing distracted for a moment, but then she grimaced in pain, which turned into a snarl and another ‘sonic’ thump with her weapon. She pointed a finger at Puck. “Someone as weak as you, and someone as weak of will as Zadkiel, never could do as you claim, nor even lay a scratch on that sage. Not if Klymene and Deikmorn fell. Not if Glaelychus retreated. I’ve fought them all. You’re a liar.”
Well, hardly wrong, is she? But only right in truth, not in what is right. What she is doing is entirely wrong.
Puck merely grinned. “Why aren’t you running, then? You linger in order to die, Dreixia, and you are bringing your entire clan down with you. Hardly the hallmark of someone thinking clearly, is it?”
Rage painted her features. “I am the Clan Matron! You’ve no call to question me or my business, parasite!”
Puck’s grin widened. She floated off from her mount, deliberately getting closer, and swept her arms wide to the assembled. “Yet. I. Am. Everyone that you’ve fought and supposedly knew the mettle of? You haven’t fought me. Not only do I question you, I challenge you. Here before all your clan champions.” Her eyes shifted left and right. “What say you, Naugites? Will that prove it? Will that assuage your doubts?”
Ba Ra’s voice was in her head. “I hope you know what you’re doing. You could’ve split them or even made them turn on her after your showing. This is a gamble.”
“You’re probably right,” Sammy answered. “But going for the total victory — what could be more Naugite than that?”
“Nothing. Everything you’ve done here is what they live for.”
The crowd was full of horned warriors looking at each other. Even Dreixia’s aides exchanged glances, though they kept their faces rather unreadable. Sammy noticed another figure off in the shadows, perhaps having been there a while without being noticed, though they weren’t exactly hiding. They were further hidden in a cowled cloak, with hints of gray armor underneath. Silent and watchful.
A scarred Naugite woman in full plate broke the silence with a raised-up halberd. “Duel!” Another banged a shield with a mace. “Duel!” A few more called the same.
The calls became a chorus of banged shields, slammed butts of polearms, and a chant of ‘Duel! Duel! Duel!”
Oddly, Dreixia’s anger seemed to drain amid that cry. Her face had a cold shadow cross over it as she glared up at Puck, meeting her eyes. Somewhere deep within those eyes was something more than mere spite clawing out of the haze of misery — satisfaction, understanding, resignation, Sammy didn’t know exactly.
The Naugite Matron-warrior’s eyes suddenly widened and she replied somewhat quietly, “I accept.”
Then she gave a much louder warcry and leapt through the air at Puck with a speed and force much in contrast to her size and weakness, her weapon rising and coming down in a whiplike motion.
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image [https://i.imgur.com/EK9Y4y9.png]
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