A Story From The Elders—

The world loves us.

Any Kin born with the ability to use mana will tell you that. Our spells, cast with the tiniest flicker of mana, will burst with strength, fueled and reinforced by the world itself.

This does not mean we are all-powerful, as we are far from that. Olimpians, though they are hated and suppressed by the world as much as we are loved, can match our strength.

Remember that, children, oppression breeds strength.

As Olimpians gather together, their mental powers become stronger. They are able to push back the world's oppression and manipulate the forces of nature.

Crude as their control may be, there is a power in simplicity.

Their powers shape the land around them, then their willpower seeps into their creations, strengthening their fortifications beyond what the material should have.

And yet their fortifications and cities are nothing to us.

Our spells can span years! And their might is unmatched!

If we have the time to prepare. If we can see the threat coming.

Which is why we must be wary of the Letairry and their tricks.

Why we remain ever vigilant.

**********

The tall grass lashed Kanieta's legs and waist as she sprinted through the clear night. Stationed around her were the Shades, nothing more than dark spots in the night, acting as her bodyguards.

A couple hundred yards in front of them was what was left of the section of wall they were approaching, which was hardly more than a few blocks stacked atop each other.

Kanieta was not happy about the spell's success, though. A hole of uncertainty had formed and grew in her gut as she drew closer to the walls.

While the stone was nearly gone from this portion of the once fortifications, that was not true for the bodies. The Kin warriors and the occasional legionary covered the land until it was nearly blanketed.

Already so many dead.

Straitening her spine in resolve, Kanieta shouldered the new weight pressing down on her. But it wasn't new. She just didn't know how heavy the burden really was until now. Kanieta could not remember when it happened, but she had stopped moving in the middle of the corpses.

Leaping forward, she danced between the dead, splashing her ankles with the pools of intermingled blood between the bodies. She did not look down, only focusing on her objectives. The future.

Kanieta already had more than enough nightmares. She didn't need to add the faces of the dead she trod upon to them.

To her sides, the darker patches of the night kept pace with her, bearly a silent witness to her actions.

Then she moved onto the scorched furrowed ground of the Northern Fort of the Triad, which marked where the wall stood. The sharp copper smell of blood twanged off the odor of ozone.

She was with the Red Tail mages when they cast the final part of the thunder spell. There was nowhere else she would rather be.

No matter how this all turns out, the Thunder Storm and Call of The Lightning Dragon spells they just cast would go down as some of the greatest spells cast by her people. Our history is admittedly short compared to Olimpians, but the amount of preparation involved guarantees its title for a while. Kanieta thought to herself with an upward curl of her lips.

Sure, there were spells that had a more significant impact on the Kin's culture and their mage craft, like the spell Calling To Kin, which allowed them to enlighten The Lost. And the amplification and melding of mana circles, not to mention enchanting, but those were different.

Those were all significant discoveries or a progression of the craft. The foundation that future generations would take for granted and use to propel themselves to new heights.

But what her faction had just done was an unprecedented act. An act that the other clans had scoffed at. They derided the Red Tail, saying their focus on the more theoretical areas of mage craft rather than the purely physical enhancements and enchantments of the body and items was idiotic.

They scorned her ideas. The hard work of her faction and drive to improve. Of course, those comments were led by the Crescent Moon Faction and those pandering to them. But the other factions went along with them because they were growing in power. Who's growing in power now?

Bunch of cowards, Kanieta thought, her mental voice filled with scorn. They all went along with the wolves because dogs were always baying the loudest… Never taking the time to think for themselves.

The one thing that the Red Tail and Crescent Moon Factions could agree on was they needed to act now while they still could. If they decided to fight in their mountain strongholds and valleys like most of the other factions wanted, eventually, they would be overwhelmed by the Lost.

If there was one major difference between mana and psy users, it was that psy users could perform at their optimal level nearly instantly and last until their energy ran out. Mana users took time and could only last so long before having to restock on ingredients for broken or worn-out focuses.

With time and the required focuses, mages can reach a level far surpassing psy users, but it takes weeks, if not months, of planning.

A perfect example were the spells just cast by her faction. They were the culmination of months of careful planning and spellcasting as they created the correct circumstances for the weather. And that wasn't even counting the development of the spells such as lightning blast, which acted as the foundation for the spell formations. Even calling simple spells like fireball or earth move would eventually wear out a focus if used enough, so proper preparation was always a question in the back of a good mage's mind.

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And then there was the struggle of casting and then containing the spell.

Her clan's, and the rest of the faction's, mages had been continuously holding back the last step of the spell for weeks. It took time to gather the required electrical energy in the air. Then, after collecting the energy, they had to move it without an actual storm forming before they were ready. It was… a struggle to say the least.

The only way to describe the spell was grand. And she was part of it…

Kanieta might have only given a slight amount of mana at the end and a few other times along the way, not even really needed, but that didn't matter.

What mattered was the results.

And now everyone, the rest of the clans and the Olimpians, knew. All the Olimpians needed to know was the Kin could destroy their fortresses at a whim. If nothing else, they had to respect and fear that fact.

Other Kin factions would see the results of their spell and want that power for themselves. And more importantly, they would see different levels of success in the two plans.

The Crescent Moon couldn't even take their wall, and their plan to take the Middle Fort utterly failed.

No one needed to know that her intervention was significantly — if not wholly, because the Olimpians would have underestimated us — responsible for the defenders' success.

All that mattered was the Crescent Moon Faction's attack failed, and the Red Tails' attack succeeded.

No, it more than succeeded. It shattered the legion's defenses. And the legion.

Kanieta looked at what was left of the northern stone fort.

The thousands of bolts that fell onto the buildings and legionaries inside the walls had left havoc in their wake.

While the lightning bolts were guided and controlled to a certain extent, they still acted within their nature. Which was just fine with those who cast the spell.

The bodies of more than a dozen legionaries lay just past the trench. No wounds marred their forms, but their steel helms had black fingers covering their tops. Some were different with the arcing on their chests, but it was usually on the head.

Hundreds of similar bodies lay beyond the first hundred yards, some looking like they were frozen mid-run heading toward cover.

Those who ran into buildings could almost be said to be worse off.

The spell was, after all, meant to destroy a fortress. The walls were covered in cracks or had chunks blown out of them, undermining their stability and causing portions to fall.

She could not see a building that didn't have at least a collapsed wall. But it was surprising how many buildings were still mostly standing.

"They sure know how to build," Kanieta said to herself as she looked around.

The sounds of fighting filled the fort, but they were distant, which made sense. As Kanieta was still approaching, the few legionaries manning the intact wall disappeared behind the battlements.

What more could they do? A quarter-mile section of the wall was destroyed along with its defenders. Anyone could see the fort was lost to the legion.

A portion of the warband was lightly pushing into the fortress, but they more setting up a defensive line while most of the warband was rushing to cut off the bridge.

Some warriors might get a little wild as they succumb to blood lust, but it would not last long. The war leaders knew the plan and would keep the warriors in line.

They were not here to make a mortal enemy of the legion but to get a better bargaining position.

Signaling the Shades, she engulfed herself in shadows. Jumping forward, tendrils of shadow springing out and latching onto the roof of a building, they pulled her to it.

Though the moon's dim light was shining again, it could not get past her darkness. Landing on the stone, Kanieta felt it start to give way beneath her.

Sprinting, she ran along the roof, leaping across one street to the next. In such a way, leaving a few completely accidentally collapsed buildings and walls in her wake, she made her way into the heart of the fortress. To her sides, she saw the slightly darker outline of other Shades, helping her search.

A few minutes later, as she was randomly running around, one of the Shades signaled her they had found a potential target. Moving to follow, Kanieta stopped.

Kneeling in the middle of the road, looking at a collapsed building, was Green.

"How did he end up here?" She whispered, slightly amazed. Keeping still for a moment, she made up her mind,

Forming a hand sign to the Shades to secure the area, she moved to the road ten feet from Green, strands of shadow peeling off her form like they were reluctant to leave it.

Kanieta waited for a moment, seeing if he would notice.

When it became apparent he was lost in his own mental world, as he stared blankly at the intermingled rubble and bodies, she softly spoke. "I am truly sorry for the loss of life. But this is necessary."

He slowly turned to her, like his neck was a rusted joint barely capable of moving. Green's face was stricken with despair before it twisted with burning fury. His forest green eyes erupted like a raging fire had consumed the previous indifference. She half expected his wrath to be made manifest and consume the world in fire. The intensity of the look made Kanieta take a half step back as it was like nature itself had focused on her for an instant. Her instincts screamed at her to flee, but before she could bolt, the pressure vanished, leaving her heart in her chest and slightly winded.

Like he was spitting out something fowl, he said, "How is this necessary? Your people obviously were content to remain hidden in your mountains. We didn't even know you existed. And now you decided to invade our land? Steal our souls to enhance your powers? Why?"

Kanieta flinched back at the accusation. She did not agree with and would have never allowed the practice of soul harvesting, but it did happen. And it was her kin that did it.

“…The dark elves are coming." Kanieta finally said in resignation. The weight of her people's survival was pressing down on her. The other Factions could not see it was necessary to make peace with the Olimpians.

Green looked at her, his face twisted with fury. He no doubt expected to hear some excuse about wanting to expand their territory or that her people thought the Olimpians were lesser beings. While that was true to some extent, that was not why they were here. As that was all Kanieta said, his face contorted to almost something normal with confusion.

She spoke with honesty and conviction. He will feel my honesty and respon— "What?" Green asked in bewilderment. "Who are the Dark Elves?"

Kanieta blinked at Green, then slowly spoke, expecting him to laugh at her for saying the obvious. "Umm, purple-skinned elves with black or violet hair, same with their eyes. Don't like the light. Live underground. Can control the L— Ahh, they can control savage… beastkin…"

Green's eyes widened at the last comment, and he flinched back in fear. "What!? They can control you?"

"No!" Kanieta snapped, slashing her arm. “Ahh… They can control the mindless. Those who are still lost to their instincts. The beastkin you expected us to be."

Realization flashed on his face, and he nodded, "Ahh, the normal beastkin…" He trailed off, looking more embarrassed now than angry as he realized who he was talking to.

“…Yes," Kanieta said, her tone dry before moving on. "The dark elves have harassed my people for centuries, but they are finally coming out of their holes in large unified numbers. They are gathering the hoards of savage beastkins to the size you speak of in your legends and are preparing to march on these lands."

"Umm, what?"

Sighing like she was talking to an idiot, she said, "...Let me fully explain."