I left my home expecting warmth, all I got was freezing wind. There were more leaves on the ground today, something I noticed about them was that they made sneaking around tough it was annoying, but I could also see myself hiding in a pile waiting for a creature to go by me. I’d have to see if that would work once there were more leaves.
I looked at my now growing wings, the hot sensation in the stumps kept moving throughout the night and into the day, I think they were getting regrown, but I’m not sure as I wasn’t keeping track, the ends were rounder than before.
I looked back at the hole leading to my home, slightly annoyed that the pup hadn’t yet followed, I wanted to go back to the creek to check my [Status] and clean the blood off me.
I really must stop eating so messily, I think I scared the pup last time.
I didn’t bother waiting for the pup and started heading to the creek.
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Inside an obsidian tower reaching into the sky
A person, more armor than flesh, strode through the dark interior of the tower of Eternity, shattered glass crunching under his sheer weight, corpses of skeletons, ghouls, living armor and abominations littered the long corridor. The sound of blades clashing, and the roar of flames sounded not too distant, the person had comrades, yet he walked non-hurriedly, either he was a coward or someone who put trust into his comrades' skills.
He slowly and methodically ascended the stairs at the end of the corridor, a corpse of an abomination being flung past him, splattering, and adding green blood to the pool of red in the corridor. The person paid no mind to the corpse and continued. The songs of battle sung out; they were close.
The surroundings of the person turned silent for him as he reached for the purple great sword sheathed behind him, a gift from a human, an ego sword that increased to his size, countless whispers of prosperity and power invading his mind. He paid them no mind, absolute power does not need more, and they left him alone as he held the sword in one hand.
With one last step, he reached the apex of the stairs and a large room with four figures clashing was shown to him.
His two generals clashed with a large brown furry abomination and an abomination of feathers and scales. His other generals were not there with him for he did not need any of them.
In retrospect, he did not need these two, but one of them was here for training. That one was a headless female knight, Sel a simple name for the lowest ranking general, yet the name meant power and mental strength in the ancient tongue. Sel was the first to bring up invading the so called ‘Tower of Eternity,’ a name not fitting for it.
The second, a red set of living armor that was always talking, Lumin a name meaning lesser in the ancient tongue to remind him of his status, he unlike the female, was here as punishment.
The two had no harmony when fighting together, they should have been dead by now, or at least sent back to the land of the dead, yet it seems luck, a concept he disliked but would acknowledge its works as he saw Lumin accidentally trip Sel causing it to dodge a bolt of white fire which bolted right towards him.
He once again paid it no mind, he simply cut down the bolt of fire, purple flames momentarily appearing, swallowing the white fire in seconds, completely disintegrating the magic keeping the flame alive.
The four were locked in battle, something the person, no, the Overlord did not want to ruin. His subjects were still useless in terms of skill, they had no experience, they were only relying on their passive [Skills].
Though he did not fault them for their uselessness, they had awoken not too long ago, children in his eyes.
It seems their luck finally fun out as the claws of the brown abomination ripped off Sel’s dominant arm and Lumin got his entire leg removed due to an explosion from a high level [Meteor]. The Overlord finally decided to step in, its ashen desolate armor glimmering in the fire. He was massive, standing at 9feet tall, not counting the three-prong crown on his head, adding a quarter of a foot to his height.
His head was missing but there were four blue eyes floating in pure darkness. The darkness itself was not still as it cascaded down his armor.
Even though he looked extremely slow due to his frame, he moved gracefully like water. He cut down the feathery scaley abomination first, the scales proved no challenge to his blade. The now dead abomination exploded into purple flames, something that did not surprise the overlord rather he immediately used [Absolute Authority] on the brown abomination. He would have slain both, yet he needs answers of the whereabouts of his beneficiary.
“I am the Overlord of Dread; you have taken a creature whom I have taken personal interest in, such a crime is punishable by death by itself, yet you have forgone your mortality in turn for cursed power, death is inevitable for such deeds.”
The Overlord said while the feathery abomination continued silently burning, his voice cold and uncaring, the brown abomination eyes shook for it had no other way of expressing itself.
“Your decisions will decide how painful your execution will be, speak and you will die painlessly.”
The Overlord looked back at his subordinates, Sel were kneeling while Lumin struggled with one leg.
“Lumin your efforts are acknowledged, you two are dismissed.”
“Thank you, my Liege.”
Lumin said while Sel stayed silent, which the Overlord did not mind as she had no way of communication other than simple gestures and writing, however such things were not acceptable at this time.
He stopped watching them, Sel quickly stood up and went to assist Lumin, holding out a hand which Lumin grabbed.
“Greenhorn you need to watch your footing more, it makes a drunkard dancing seem majestic.”
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Lumin said once he got on one foot, Sel punched him in the pauldron in return for his comment, causing him to stumble a bit until Sel steadied him.
The two turned to look at the Overlord who did not pay any attention to their tomfoolery, Lumin stayed quiet as he wrapped an arm around Sel grabbing onto her shoulder, and she wrapped her remaining arm around his waist to allow them to support each other. Sel was shorter than Lumin, making it rough leaving the room.
Lumin had also taken Sel’s discarded arm, but not his leg which was thrown around as it had nothing to connect to. It was more time consuming to gather his leg and Lumin could tell his lord was not willing to wait.
“You should really stop losing your arm, this is the third time.”
Lumin said as they started descending awkwardly down the stairs. With that the Overlord allowed the brown abomination to speak.
“The Great-”
The sound of a bone crunching before snapping and the sound of flesh being ripped echoed through the large room as one of the abominations claws was ripped out of the paw. However, no blood flowed from the wound.
“You will answer my questions.”
The Overlord said as the abomination tried not to make any noise. The sound of panting filled the room, before bones breaking and flesh tearing sounded again, another claw was removed, six more left.
“Do not waste my time, speak, where is have you taken the creature called ‘Eclipse’.”
The Overlord said after the abomination finished yelling in pain.
“This is-”
Another claw was removed.
“Though I am a busy lord, I will spend my free time slowly taking you apart until you are nothing more than a soul wearing a husk, then I will repair your body and make you go through everything again and again until I get my answers.”
The Overlord spoke clearly and calmly.
The eyes of the brown abomination widened but stayed stern. The next claw removals, the abomination stayed quiet with only some whimpering.
“I am the servant of the Great Nurüiath, I will not betray my lord and master! This is nothing!”
The abomination laughed maniacally, tears and snot covering its face.
“Your loyalty is admirable, yet you have put your faith in the wrong thing.”
Not even a second later, the slow sound of flesh getting cut sounded, the abomination screamed as a strip of its flesh was removed, displaying bones underneath.
This time the Overlord did not stop, it continued stripping off more and more flesh off the creature.
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“p-please st- st- stop. I wi-will t-tell y-you.”
The abomination sounded weak, and its voice was hoarse due to all the screaming. The corpse of the feathery abomination was no longer there, it had already burned away into nothingness by the purple flame.
It was a miracle the brown abomination was alive for what was left of the brown abomination. Only its skeletal structure, that looked like a human but with long arms, was what remained the abomination’s form. Only some organs remained, these were: the lungs, heart, brain, and one kidney. Even in this state, the abomination’s heart still pumped.
Once the Overlord heard what he wanted, he turned off [Absolute Authority] and the abomination finally died with its skeleton collapsing next to a pile of flesh and fur.
The Overlord did not spend another second in the room and started leaving, his destination was somewhere up North across the ocean. He was far too busy to leave for a couple of months, from what he could tell by the distance, however two of his generals could leave. He already had the two in mind: Sel and Lumin. It will be an effective way to form comradeship between the two of them.
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“My Lord you have called for me?”
Lumin’s voice sounded through the large stone building where the Overlord of Dread sat on a makeshift throne. The building had different undead creatures inside either standing guard in exquisite armor, or in messy clothes working on murals, yet it was emptied once the Overlord commanded them.
Lumin's leg was fixed, but his it looked extremely different compared to the rest of the armor, it looked rougher and like scrap metal while being different shades of grey.
Sel was not with Lumin even though the Overlord called for both.
“Yes, but I have also called for Sel, where is she?”
The Overlord rested his nonexistent chin on his knuckle as he looked down at Lumin.
“She is having her arm reattached by the healer.”
“That would make sense, how is your leg? It looks very bulky.”
“Thank you, my Lord, for your worry, I am not fully recovered to be thrown back into combat due to the poor quality of the leg.”
“Hmm, I will find a replacement armorer for yourself if such low-quality products are expected.”
Silence filled the building as the Overlord looked curiously at Lumin, as if he were waiting for something.
“My Lord I do not think that is needed.”
“Hm? Explain your reasoning to why you want low-quality products.”
Lumin shuffled a little before explaining.
“My Lord my personal armorer did not create this lump of metal, he is currently creating a replacement leg fitting my standards. This lump of metal... I tried creating myself.”
A booming laugh sounded from the Overlord.
“Forgive me Lumin, this would be my first-time hearing of Living Armor creating armor for itself! Do you really have time for such things?”
“I mostly practice when I have free time, if you so command, I will end this hobby of mine.”
“There is no reason to stop such a thing, rather this is a good thing, an undead that only kills will lose the last bits of their life energy and become mindless beasts filled with the energy from the land of the dead. You are not the only undead that has a hobby.”
“Thank you, my Lord.”
Without warning the large double wooden doors were thrown open as the undead guarding it were not able to open it in time, and in stepped Sel who hurriedly kneeled in front of the Overlord.
“Sel you may stand, how is your arm doing? This would be your third reattachment, correct?”
After a moment Sel gave a thumbs-up, something that would be considered rude, but for Sel this is the only way she can ‘speak’ other than writing.
“I see, now with that out the way, you two listen carefully as I will not be repeating my order.”
The Overlord waited for a moment before standing up and traversing to the right of the room where a war table sat, it was not the correct placement for a war table as this was supposed to be a throne room, however it would do for now.
The Overlord motioned for the two of them to come over.
“I was successfully able to extract enough information from the abomination that I know of two things, one is the general location of the creature called ‘Eclipse’ you two are already familiar with it, so I will not go into detail. Eclipse is currently located somewhere far up North past an ocean; the entire trip should take a maximum of 4 months, not including searching for the creature, but the sooner the better. A squad of abominations has used the built in teleportation array inside the Tower of Eternity to escape far up North and destroyed the array before any of your troops could go through it as you have stated in your reports.“
The Overlord paused, letting the two of them digest the information before continuing.
“Your main mission is to apprehend these abominations and prevent them from kidnapping Eclipse once again and secure the creature yourselves, your second mission is gaining information about any kingdoms you pass through. Do you understand?”
“Yes, my Lord, I will go inform my legion.”
“No, you two will go alone. And on the other note, your equipment will be... different from what you are both used to.”
“Very well my Lord, may I know the reason?”
“You both have lost 2 battalions worth of troops taking over a single tower due to bad planning and miscommunication, until you both prove yourselves in combat and display superior teamwork, you two will no longer receive troops. As for your equipment... think of it as a test, you both will be tasked with acquiring better gear during the journey. If your energy leaves this realm, both of you will be demoted to common troops once one of the kingdom Litches re-summon you. Must I remind you many seek your position?”
“No, my Lord, I understand. I will not disappoint you again, when will we be leaving.”
“You both will leave tomorrow, general Jurg will give you your equipment. You two are dismissed.”
The two saluted before leaving the building quickly