Seros wanted to rush to the nearest tavern, but Fran convinced him that getting Amira her most amazing meal since her arrival at Azgadal would be a better idea.
“Imagine what she's been through. Her god has abandoned her. That poor woman feels depressed and humiliated. Let's get her something nice and she’ll love us for it.”
Fran took the risk of going out to buy the food. He was the least recognizable one in the group, that’s for sure. He cautiously walked to the inns near the mail square and ordered fish and stew to go. Then he noticed the food’s wonderful scent and ordered four portions instead. He was almost back to the terrible quarter where his colleagues awaited when he wondered if the necromancer could eat normal food.
“This is good,” said Sancho. Despite his body being a tangle of bones and emptiness, the food disappeared into his mouth with every bite. “The best meal I've had this side of, well, you know.”
They all tensed up at the slip and looked at the priestess. Her five senses were focused on the delicious meal and hadn't noticed the necromancer's remark. She ate slowly, nodding to herself with every bite. Perhaps the part of her that had given up was conceding a small victory to the part that held on to hope. After, they sat at the quiet little square under the afternoon sun and the priestess began her story.
“The New Alliance isn't the only group of outsiders. Have you heard of the Poison Roses? No? What about the Nightmare Hunters? They might be the same group for all I know. In any case, the following story took place in Arcabria during the Summer Solstice three years ago. A young lady in love begged for my help. It's hard to believe how wonderful my daily life was. Advancing the cause of passion was my only concern. I can't recall her name, but she told me that she was part of a group called the New Alliance. She described it as a fraternity of questing heroes”.
“However, this woman had made an accidental discovery that turned her life upside down. She'd discovered the existence of another group called the Nightmare Hunters. Or maybe the Poison Roses, but what matters is that these groups were mortal enemies of the New Alliance for reasons she wouldn't explain. She'd fallen madly in love with an enemy knight from this group. She admitted this man was an 'unusual knight,’ a common euphemism at the time. This was back when the first chaos fluxes broke into Mela and destroyed whole kingdoms. Over 50 countries cast their differences aside to form a covenant. The unthinkable became inevitable and the covenant accepted the domains of Vampire Lords and worshippers of the gods of Death, Might and Destruction. As a result, Dark Knights on their way to the front became a common sight for a few months until the alliance blew up. The man she loved led a group of cold-hearted adventurers, adherents of a macabre perversion of the code of chivalry. Yet he fell in love with her too. This only made things worse. The lady was about to be inducted into a secret society of some kind called the Inner Ring. She’d been admitted because of a discovery she made. She'd found an explorer that the New Alliance believed dead long ago. He was dying when she found him. She took care of him for six days, but he died before the seventh. Keeping him alive for seven days was crucial for some reason, but she wouldn't explain why. The explorer died anyway, but not before sharing the secrets that granted her access to the Inner Ring. It was his way of thanking her for taking care of him on his deathbed. She only told me one thing about the secrets: The explorer had made it to Mela’s outer border in the East. The woman felt conflicted about sharing the man’s secrets. Apparently, the New Alliance had tried to kill this explorer and thought they'd succeeded. Would it be ethical to share his secrets with his enemies? And then there's love, the true matter at hand. Her oaths demanded she report her evil-worshipping lover. She hadn't so far, but taking the oath of the Inner Ring would force her to both share the secrets and betray her lover. Forsaking that oath would have been too much for her.”
The priestess' dark mood returned to her eyes and silence took over.
“Did she join the Inner Ring?” asked Fran.
“She jumped off a cliff near the rainbow beaches of Uarson. The most beautiful view in Arcabria, all thanks to the influence of my god, whose grace perfumes the air in that land.”
A pair of hands clapped loudly, interrupting the priestess’ story. Fran turned to watch Sancho the necromancer heading toward them. He walked a bit faster than normal and also quite awkwardly from the stress of walking both as fast as possible and as casually as possible.
“What’s up?” asked Seros.
Sancho clapped again. Behind him, the sound of heavy feet approached like a monster wave. A group of a dozen guards, men dwarves and even elves, arrived from two side streets.
“They’re here, Your Holiness.”
“They’re here! They’re here! On the double!”
Fran swore as he looked to the side streets. On the left, more armed spearmen approached at a steady pace. A few were already placing their spear staffs right over their shields for the attack.
On the right, a putrid smell of manure and savagery spread over the street. At its center stood a 3-meter tall creature with enormous arms, thick animal hair, a wide nose, sharp white horns and the eyes of a killer.
“A minotaur,” whispered Seros. “They’re not supposed to be here. None of the guards are supposed to be here! Fuck me!”
Climbing was the only way out. Fran looked up, but it was in vain. Seros had decided for a different approach. He roared like a berserk lion and ran toward the thinner group of guards staff in hand, but the staff emitted a golden flash of light and turned into a large double axe with a sculpted white handle.
Fran drew his swords. He feared this wasn’t the best idea, but he couldn’t leave Seros behind. He screamed as loud as he could and charged toward the spears and the grey kite shields of the guards. Behind him, a bovine growl asked him to stop or die. When he was just a couple of steps away from the protruding spear tips, Fran jumped, and the power of the jump surprised him. He floated comfortably above the line of guards. He leaned down and accelerated, falling sword-first between a guard’s face and his shield. Fran’s short sword slashed his face and the guard screamed for a brief moment before falling to the ground. His main sword hit two guards to his right, making them retreat. Seros’s axe hit two more guards, who fell down the road like bowling pins. Fran could now see the empty street open up like a red carpet on gala night.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Fran ran a few meters as fast as he could. He turned his head to check how many guards were following and how close Seros followed. He didn’t. The lion was delivering strike after strike in an ecstasy of blood.
“How dare you!” he screamed. “How dare you!”
“We have to run!” screamed Fran.
“You chose death this morning, yes you did!” The axe blades were completely bathed in blood.
Fran heard the minotaur growl as he raised his own double axe, a rusty weapon of deathly angles. Devoted to his deathly dance, Seros couldn’t even see him.
Fran ran back while he screamed a warning to his friend. He knew what to do. The minotaur’s armor ended at his waist, so Fran decided to jump between the minotaur’s legs and slash his legs with both swords. He charged, ready to strike, but at the last second an immovable obstacle landed in front of him with a thunderous sound. The minotaur’s axe, its blade positioned against Fran's incoming body. Hitting the blade would mean a sure death. At the last second, Fran striked the axe with his sword. The impact allowed him to change the course of his momentum to the left, away from the minotaur, and he fell to the ground. But a mass of swords, spears and shields covered his vision now, closing in by the second. A sea of guards stood over Fran’s lying body, ready to spear him like a pin cushion in revenge for the death of their colleagues.
“Alive,” bellowed a low voice he’d heard before. “An audience with our benevolent protector awaits this creature.”
The guards spat their anger as they turned the spears around. One of them tried to hit him with the flat end of his spear. Fran deflected the hit from the floor with his sword. He deflected a second one, a third, even a fourth, but there were just too many. A forest of spears poked his body every second. A dull pain spread across his torso, his genitals, his arms, and then his eyes, mouth and face too. The strongest pain he’d ever felt, a pain that made him feel like a mass of nerves being assaulted in every possible way. He screamed but he didn’t surrender. His swords still tried to catch the spears and his eyes looked for an exit. But the hits kept on coming, making his screams louder until he stopped screaming because the pain had stopped, the noise of the hard wood hitting his nose and his skull had quieted down.
Life had stopped, and he couldn’t help feeling a little relieved.
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Fran's eyes opened into a red, bright world. The air felt cold against his skin. Voices echoed around him. A numb pain took over until his body gave up and returned to unconsciousness.
Later, perhaps minutes, perhaps days, voices rang closer. Concealed anger spilled over in their words.
“That’s one of most exacting rituals, Your Holiness. We might lose deacons performing it.”
“You think I don’t know, brother?”
Fran opened his eyes. A red pain world once more. His back leaned against cold, flat stone. So did his legs. He couldn’t move them.
“What a waste, what a waste! I’m begging you, Your Holiness, we’ll be risking the lives of four deacons.”
“You’re begging me what, Brother Ekuhrbit?”
“Why this exceptional rite? There are other ways of using the power of the blood to heal, slower ways. Return to the cave. Make the Protector understand.”
The first voice exploded.
“Make Azgal understand?”
Fran glimpsed a shaking black hood to his right. “Explain things to the Protector? Like you just explained the ritual to me?”
“My apologies, Your Holiness. I get lost in my studies sometimes.”
“Your work teaching the novices makes you think everything is a matter of teaching, of words. Shall I give you a month in the pits to remind you what’s real?”
“I beg your pardon, Your Holiness. The preparations will begin immediately.”
“Meet me again when it’s all done. I won't for get this. It’s the arrogance and the reveries of brothers like you that saw us massacred and exiled.”
The pain grew too strong. Fran interrupted the conversation with a gasp. A hood leaned in and Fran returned to his dark sleep.
Time came and went, along with pain, fear, the soft sounds of sandals and robes.
It was the chorus that woke him up after that. Bells rang. Something wet and liquid fell over his chest. Coarse hands spread it delicately over his body. Knives shone against the red light. Where did the red light come from? That was the last thought on Fran's mind before he lost consciousness once more.
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When he next awoke, the world felt like Mela again. Bright, hopeful and free. His body lay on the softest bed he’d ever experienced. It was like sleeping on clouds. Did they sell stuff this good on Earth? Bedsheets of the finest cotton and warm blue blankets covered him. His head rested on a pillow made of clouds too. Maybe he’d have to reassess his ideas about the lack of comfort in Mela.
He rose and noticed that he wasn’t naked anymore. He withdrew the cotton sheets and saw that he was wearing a sleeping robe and socks. His body and hair had been cleaned thoroughly. And the pain was gone, completely gone. Fran felt his face in his hands. No pain and no signs of swelling. His body didn’t have any wounds or scars either. He thought that a lot of time must have passed, but he would have woken up back on Earth in that case. Had someone healed him? The memories were fragmented, but he knew he was in the hands of the Blood Monks.
Fran looked around him distractedly, still thinking about what the monks might want from him, and his mouth dropped in awe. He found himself in a large cave with the diameter of a football field. Anywhere his eyes looked, mountains of gold coins shone bright, reflecting the light that came from the cave's only entry, a wide rock hole that lead to a dark blue sky. Was it dusk or dawn?
Fran left the bed and walked around slowly. The cave was filled with hundreds of thousands of coins, extending like a second floor. But his bed wasn't the only object for human use in the space. A ring of cabinets lined the cave. All of them were filled with jewels, rings, amulets, necklaces, mirrors, books, clothes and weapons of all kinds. Some items were so big that they were outside the cabinets: Full body armors for all sort of species, war chariots supported by horses of metal and onyx, Enormous doors carved with warnings in a dozen languages. Fran knew that many of these items were more than mere treasure because he felt an acrid taste in his mouth. Sancho had told him about that: It's the taste of a high concentration of magic. Fran regarded every item one by one with curiosity now he knew what surrounded him: A collection of magic items that only the Emperor could rival. It was like being able to visit the Louvre on your own.
Suddenly, the cavern went dark like the sun had died. A large, imposing mass blocked the entry to the cave. The large body made its way in with natural elegance and regarded Fran with large reptilian eyes of undeniable intelligence. Azgal the black dragon had returned home.
Fran stood frozen in front of one of the cabinets. He never imagined dragons could be this quiet.