Azarus landed in front of Kuscal, where he was waiting with his pillar of purple lightning lazily slung over both shoulders. The God of Majestic Clouds smirked at Azarus’s umbrella, his beard flashing with lightning. He made a gesture with his hand. The lightning rain ceased, causing the world to go dark. A pillar of lightning struck from the gathered clouds, shaped like an angry dragon. It reached the ground in an instant, sinking teeth and claws into Kuscal’s staff.
Kuscal maintained a casual stance as his staff reabsorbed the energy he had sent into the thundercloud. Thunder shook the hall, the distant violet pillars quaking. Despite Kuscal compressing his form, the hall had maintained its size. The pillars were massive structures on the horizon, providing faint illumination. Deep purple thunderclouds, dark enough to be black, consumed the sky. The ground, covered in tiles of compressed cirrocumulus clouds, emitted a soft white glow a few feet off the ground, in all directions for miles.
The two gods faced each other, the only beings in this otherworldly dimension. Kuscal shot Azarus a wintry smile.
“Come to take your beating like a man, I see.”
Doing a quick double-take, Azarus gave Kuscal a blank look. He had expected the other god to swinge on him as soon as he landed, if not before. After due consideration, Azarus decided he could spare a few seconds for pleasantries. Plastering a pleasant smile on his face, he closed his umbrella, choosing to lean against it like a cane and crossing his legs. He laid the flat of his sword on his shoulder, mimicking Kuscal’s lax posture. Keeping the ‘pleasant’ in pleasantries in mind, Azarus kept his tone bright and relaxed.
“If you do not mind me asking, why are you not more concerned?”
Kuscal let out a quick, disgusted snort, his lips tensing into an ugly twist. His tone was as flat as his eyes. He continued insisting on speaking at full volume, his domain vibrating with his words.
“Why would I be? You wield the strength of a demi-god at best.” Kuscal made a broad gesture toward the haunting and strange landscape. “You have strength, but you cannot shape reality. The God of Restless Winds could wear at my domain itself. You can merely poke and prod at it. There is nothing you can do to kill me.”
Azarus felt his eye twitch, reminded of the trademark arrogance of gods. He could not help but wonder if this was what he sounded like. Surely not. He was nowhere as arrogant as Kuscal. The fool did not fear him, a piece of the universe itself made flesh!
The irony of the mental proclamation caught up with Azarus a moment later, causing his eye to twitch. All gods were pieces of the universe made flesh. Azarus forced himself to focus, drowning his cluttered thoughts in his subconscious and bringing Moka and Granon’s potential plight to the surface of his mind.
With a flick of his wrist, Azarus touched his sword to his avian mask. In a storm of feathers, he wrapped himself in his wings as his mask transformed. When the feathers settled, Azarus remained leaning against his umbrella, clad in a full suit of armor with no wings in sight. His mask had changed into a gold visor, lined with a script of glowing emerald and gray runes. The wings manifested by the mask had become the armor, making the mask’s representation of him a reality. Ethereal flames manifested where the overlapping gold plates of the armor met. Although the armor fit him like a second skin, it made Azarus far bulkier. The interlocking gray and emerald runes binding every seam and joint glowed in the low light. He felt like a walking fortress.
Making a show of standing up straight and brushing off imaginary dust from his suit of armor, Azarus bought a little time to manage his pounding headache. The feeling of wrongness he had picked up when he transformed his domain to paint pulsed behind his eyes. He pinched his lips together and clenched his jaw, his eyes tightening. Every way he turned, there seemed to be something trying to obstruct him. He was fumbling in the dark to understand the concept he was born from, thwarted by the Mirror of Eons and its screens every step of the way, and now the universe was objecting to how he was choosing to figure things out.
Azarus stood tall, feeling every inch the paladin holding back the tide in his gleaming armor. The embers of his domain blazed inside him. Those embers had not grown, nor reignited his slumbering power, no matter how he refueled them by burning Kuscal’s domain. However, Azarus did not care. He felt more in tune with himself right now than he ever had. Beset on all sides, with nowhere to run, he braved the razor’s edge between gaining a chance to turn the tides and losing everything.
Deeming the time for polite discourse over, Azarus told Kuscal what he really thought of him.
“You are a stepping stone in my path; a minor setback. You could not even protect your own flock from a mere spirit. I will carry the burden you could not. I am meant for greater things, and you cannot stop me.”
With a folded umbrella in one hand and his sword in the other, Azarus sprinted at Kuscal. His domain blazed in his body, intermingling with the armor and lighting him up like a beacon in the night. When his pounding steps brought him close enough, Azarus gathered his weight beneath him and launched himself at Kuscal like an arrow out of a bow. He strengthened his body with his domain, letting it burn like wildfire inside him. It only took a spark to set a raging inferno in motion.
Propelled by the force of his jump, Azarus flew, meeting Kuscal in a firestorm of purple and white lightning clashing with tri-color sparks. Kuscal held his pillar of lightning vertically in front of him, catching Azarus’s double-fisted strike. Taking advantage of his superior height and Azarus’s lack of contact with the ground, Kuscal used the pillar to launch Azarus away. Countless branches of white lightning leapt from Kuscal’s pillar, pushing Azarus down. Kuscal raised the pillar straight up, summoning a bolt of lightning to strike Azarus as he hit the ground.
An explosion, laced with crackling bolts of electricity, erupted, erasing Azarus’s silhouette. Kuscal watched the lingering clouds of smoke, growing more purple by the second. He tapped his pillar in his hands, with the air of an experienced bully, judging how far he could push until his victim broke.
Lightning skittered across the surface of Azarus’s armor as he pulled himself to his feet. Spiderwebs of blackened armor covered the plate armor, chunks crumbling to dust as he moved. The interlocking gray and emerald runes flared, growing across the armor like vines, covering the blackened sections like the runes were sewing the golden plates back together.
Azarus rolled his shoulders and stretched his neck to the side, working out a slight kink. Without pause, he bolted forward, unhindered by the weight of his armor and hoping to catch Kuscal by surprise. Azarus dashed to the side as Kuscal raised his pillar overhead, tracking his every move. He stepped into Kuscal’s reach. Lightning flared, reaching out from Kuscal like thousands of hands. Kuscal brought his pillar crashing down.
Azarus let the lightning strike his armor. They rocked him with minor impacts, but he powered through. His armor mended itself with a bit of luck and questionable business dealings, fueled by an application of his domain. Judging by the wrenching feeling behind his eyes, the universe found the application distasteful. Unwavering, Azarus brought his former shield—now umbrella—up in his left hand as stepped to the side, sinking into a low stance.
One delight of an umbrella was that it was sword shaped when closed. Throwing his physical might and the strength of his domain behind the weight of his armor, Azarus swung the umbrella in a downward arc. With his other hand, he leveled his sword. The emerald handle and tips of the umbrella glowed as he caught the pillar at just the right angle to divert the force down and to the side. He took a step and lunged with his sword, skewering Kuscal in the chest, right where his robes dipped to show off his chiseled chest.
To Azarus’s dismay, his unenhanced sword did not get far. The tip struck Kuscal’s sternum, slicing through skin and muscle as it deflected off the solid bone and lodged into Kuscal’s rib cage. The warrior in Azarus screamed he was vulnerable. Azarus, already moving his left hand even as he stabbed Kuscal with his right, unfurled his umbrella. He held the handle to his chest and pointed the tip toward Kuscal, ducking his helmed face behind the umbrella’s canopy.
Kuscal transformed into a furious storm of lightning, proving Azarus’s warrior instincts correct. He sent Azarus flying, lightning strikes harassing him from the clouds above as he tumbled away. Azarus recovered quick, slamming his sword and umbrella tip first into the cloudy tiles, leaving long gouges as he bled his momentum into the ground. The armor on his right arm was a blackened, cracked, and blistered mess. His arm tingled to the point he could see it moving, but only felt static.
The gray runes on his armor were incandescent scripts as they absorbed the raining lightning strikes to stitch the golden plates back together. His right arm was so densely covered in emerald and gray scripts, the fragments of the remaining gold plates seemed like haphazardly placed badges.
“Not a god of trickery, nor courage. Perhaps you are the god of cornered things that bite.”
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The lightning storm receded, revealing Kuscal standing right where Azarus left him. Kuscal touched his fingers to the wound on his chest. He raised his hand to examine the bloodstains, keeping one eye on Azarus as he did so. A frown wrinkled his brow and tugged at his lips as he cocked his head to one side. He started to say something, then hesitated. Blinking, his expression cleared, then darkened.
“I applaud you. Your ferocity has opened my eyes. I claim it as mine, from this moment forth.”
Kuscal’s pillar of purple lightning was easily as thick as Azarus’s waist. It looked closer to a club than a staff in Kuscal’s oversized hands and long arms. Kuscal held it out in front of his chest, smearing his blood on it with a familiar touch. Purple and white lightning raged in his hands as he gripped the pillar with all his might. His muscles bulged through his robes of white lightning, branching purple veins growing up toward his beard on either side of his neck.
The pillar shattered. Wild lances of lightning illuminated the clouds above for a moment, then the light faded to a steady flicker. Seven orbs of purple and white lightning hovered over Kuscal’s head like a crown. Lightning coated his large hands, which he held spread before him.
Azarus’s mind raced as he watched Kuscal transform his domain. A part of him analyzed what exactly Kuscal was doing and why there was no accompanying feeling of wrongness. The rest of him was looking for a path to victory. Those orbs seemed far more dangerous than the previous lightning strikes and Kuscal had already proven he could overwhelm Azarus’s armor with enough concentrated power. Considering Kuscal’s grappling stance, Azarus would give one-to-one odds that the other god intended to use the orbs to cut off his retreat and his hands to tear Azarus limb from limb.
So far, Azarus had used three basic strategies inspired by the aspects of his domain; fight, make deals, and get lucky. He was the first to admit that the deals were exploitive, and it took time and concentration to force his domain to make it happen. There would be limited opportunities to do that here. Fighting and getting lucky did not seem like quite enough, even if Azarus was confident he would win, somehow. His instincts had no suggestions and as this was his first fight, he had no prior battle experience to draw from.
Kuscal charged, the orbs glowing brighter with ominous light. Azarus’s mind turned time and time again to his Champion, Moka. Most glimpses Azarus had stolen of the world outside his prison had featured her, and the way she fought. She was like a predator, moving with the purpose of killing her prey as quickly as possible. The style had its perks, but it was her creativity that made it work. Azarus decided, as Kuscal bore down on him, he would provide Moka with a martial art; it would make her a better fighter, and, coincidently, easier to draw inspiration from. He just had to invent one and give it to her without the screens’ interference. Easy.
With a touch of paint, Azarus changed his mask again. In his mind, if he was going to draw inspiration from Moka, he may as well commit to the path. Azarus’s armor exploded in a storm of tri-color sparks, causing Kuscal to stagger his charge. When the sparks burnt away, they left a cloud of smoke behind. Kuscal rushed forward, his arms spread wide. The orbs over his head shone with incandescent light. One by one, they formed into spears of lightning with purple hafts and white blades. A fraction of a second after each spear formed, they launched. The spears flew so fast they were indiscernible from true lightning. Kuscal guided the strikes, causing them to rain down behind the smoke, cutting off any retreat. By the time the seventh spear had passed over the smoke, the first had reformed. He continued the barrage, relentless, as his crackling hands closed in on either side of the smoke.
A shadow lunged from the smoke, ducking beneath Kuscal’s grasping hands and weaving under his arms. Lightning poured from Kuscal’s hands and rained down from above, chasing the shadow, but it could only nip at its heels. The shadow’s mad dash brought it to Kuscal, where it tried to hook something around his ankle and stab him in the inner thigh. In his rush to grab the shadow, Kuscal ended up knocking it away. As the shadow twisted in the air, stretching toward the ground to alter its trajectory, Kuscal got a good look at Azarus’s new form.
Azarus was once again wearing his traveler’s garb, sword and umbrella in hand, which remained relatively unchanged. His exposed skin was emerald green and covered in black tattoos, precise swirls of jagged lines promising savagery. No mask adorned Azarus’s face. Instead, he wore it like a second skin. With pointed ears, sharp golden teeth, and glowing gold eyes, Azarus had channeled Moka in a practical sense.
Kuscal’s lip curled, showing his teeth. His nose wrinkled, as he all but spat at Azarus.
“Goblin. How fitting.”
Having survived the initial assault with only a few bruises and some distance to show for it, Azarus took a second to adapt to his new representation. Running his tongue over his teeth, he marveled at how sharp they were. He flexed his claws, feeling the desire to tear into something like the longing to stretch a neglected muscle. His golden eyes narrowed to cat-like slits as he looked at Kuscal and felt his disdain.
Feeling somewhat offended, Azarus drew himself up to his full height and puffed his chest up at Kuscal. A lone spear of lightning shot out from one of Kuscal’s orbs, aimed straight at Azarus’s chest. Pushing his domain into the umbrella, Azarus strengthened his painted artifact and used it to parry the spear. With an effort of will, Azarus kept his face expressionless as his shoulder wrenched in its socket. The spear ripped into the ground less than a foot to Azarus’s side, sending currents of electricity through his body. The projectile, containing a fraction of Kuscal’s domain, maintained a portion of the former pillar’s might. If one caught Azarus unaware, it would spell the end of this battle.
Azarus let none of that show on his face, doing his utmost to seem casual after taking the spear head on. His jagged gray tattoos had lessened the nearby impact, but a direct hit would not go so well. Stifling his heavy breathing, Azarus gave into Kuscal’s game of posturing, pretending to peer at his new claws with an unhurried scrutiny as he spoke.
“Do you call yourself a god of majesty around the rest of your pantheon, or do they just laugh you away?”
Kuscal’s eyes went wide, showing the whites. His hands started trembling until he began to clench and unclench them. He flared his nostrils.
“To disrespect my majesty is to court death.”
Azarus was thankful he could resist rolling his eyes, because Kuscal was on him in an instant, his grasping hands flashing out as quick as the lightning he controlled. The crown of orbs over his head continued to produce spears, but now they gathered, a growing armada of hanging spears waiting to descend. Azarus ducked and weaved Kuscal’s hands, leaving flaming emerald and gray ghosts with golden eyes in his wake. Infused with lightning and unburdened by his pillar, Kuscal was far faster than Azarus. However, Azarus was perhaps the luckiest goblin alive at that moment. He slipped and stumbled, this way and that, whirling away from imagined blows to dodge real ones. Despite his speed, Kuscal could do little more than touch the hem of his coat.
With each near-miss, Azarus’s tattoos pulled the electricity of Kuscal’s domain out of the air and feasted on it. The lightning was freely given, so his tattoos consumed it to fuel Azarus’s domain with ease, no twisting the concept of a ‘trade’ required. Azarus’s skin leaked excess ethereal emerald flames as he stole as much power as he could stomach and forced it into his mask.
Pressing a feint and slipping the attack in its shadow, Azarus came face to face with Kuscal. He was inside Kuscal’s reach. The two locked eyes. Azarus bared his golden fangs and laughed in the God of Majestic Cloud’s face.
“Where is the majesty in a threat? We were already trying to kill each other.”
Kuscal let out a guttural roar, forcing Azarus back with a swipe. The God of Majestic Clouds raised one hand, then pointed it at Azarus. His crown of orbs lit up, shooting branches of lightning straight up to connect the hovering spears like they were the fruit of a divine tree. Hundreds of lightning spears descended, each one flying toward Azarus as if thrown by hand. A dozen came straight for him, dozens more followed a hairsbreadth behind, aiming for where he might dodge. He was already moving.
Azarus hurled his folded umbrella like a dart, sending it whistling in Kuscal’s general direction. The umbrella’s emerald handle flashed as it left his fingertips, but Azarus’s attention was already elsewhere. He was stuffing a well-worn argument into his domain, holding it in place with his will, and funneling it into the jagged tattoos coating his skin.
The argument was quick and sloppy, but it fit into his mind like a wheel slipping into a well-worn rut. He felt like he had repeated it to himself a thousand times.
He was his domain, and his domain was him. They were one.
The umbrella flew past Kuscal. He did not bother dodging it, as it would miss even without his intervention. Azarus flashed like a black, white, and green strobe light, his tattoos alternating between black and white while his skin burned green. Behind Kuscal’s head, the umbrella flashed the same three colors, out of sync with Azarus for a moment, then as one. The moment the two flashing lights synced, the plummeting spears landed with an explosion large enough to light up the great hall.
Azarus appeared where the umbrella had been, above and behind Kuscal. His eyes blazed gold. Tri-color flame lifted off his skin. Holding his sword in a reverse grip, Azarus used it like a pick, stabbing into Kuscal’s shoulder to halt his momentum.
Kuscal whirled, his eyes trailing purple and white lightning as he roared in pain. Azarus used his sword as a handle, pulling himself up and over Kuscal’s shoulder. His golden teeth glinted as arcs of electricity reached from Kuscal’s hair to Azarus’s face, blackening his emerald skin.
Azarus did what Moka would do. He nestled his face into Kuscal’s neck, then ripped his throat out with his teeth and swallowed. A splitting headache wore at his mind with every bite. Allowing himself to sink into a blind fury to escape the mental burden, Azarus ripped and tore with his claws and teeth, consuming chunks of Kuscal and his domain. Lightning burned him, but Azarus’s domain burned as well. Tri-color flame washed over Azarus, using what he consumed to knit his physical form back together. Spears pierced Azarus’s back, but he did not stop, could not stop.
Like fire, Azarus would not go out as long as there was fuel to burn. He raged like an inferno, more fire than flesh. Kuscal tried to rip him away, but Azarus hung on by tooth and claw, even as his legs were torn asunder. Tri-flame billowed from Azarus’s waist, burning Kuscal’s domain to erase any trace of damage. If Kuscal was shocked by this new display, Azarus would never know. Kuscal did not get another chance to turn the tides. It was too late for him.
When it was done and the purple clouds overhead dispersed like they were an illusion, Azarus wiped the blood from his lips with a scowl. The strategy was effective, but he did not see what Moka saw in the idea of eating your enemies. Honestly, he would have preferred to stab Kuscal to death instead.
With Moka on his mind, Azarus turned to face the consequences of his actions. A chime rang through his soul, heralding the appearance of a new notification.