Hall Bolak was loud and unruly. Lord Daron, in the absence of Lord Defon, was house speaker. He entered briskly with fury on his face. He rushed up to the podium and banged the wooden decorum hammer on it.
“Is Lord Arabambi in this room?” He bellowed loudly. Looking around. “General Makon? Lord Gilfar? Lady Umaka?”
None of the Sungan representatives were in attendance, even though they had been informed to attend. Lord Daron inhaled sharply and deeply to calm his bubbling anger.
“So this is how Sungan wishes to repay Aku’andan diplomacy?” He shouted at the hall.
“Calm yourself! Lord Daron.” Lord Kardo said, smiling as ever. “The Sungans are not here, you are screaming at your own people.”
Lord Daron was taken aback, he stepped back inhaled to calm himself and spoke calmly but sternly to the hall.
“My Lords, the Sungans have betrayed us, they have betrayed civility and wisdom. They have chosen the path of folly and they have invaded Pirun. They -”
He was interrupted by Regar who suddenly rushed in from outside, climbed the podium and whispered into his ear, draining the blood from his face.
“What is it?” Lord Fugap asked.
“They destroyed Pirun’s spell dampener.” Lord Daron said, causing an Uproar in the hall. Shouts of “Desecration!”, “Sacrilege!” rang across the hall.
“My Lords, let us remain calm, My Lords!” Lord Daron shouted, banging the wooden hammer against the podium multiple times. But he was no Lord Defon, the Lords vented for a full 2 minutes befoer he could get any decorum back into the room.
“If they have destroyed the spell dampener at Pirun,” Lord Daron said, “They undoubtedly have prepared powerful spells. Pirun will be devastated.”
“This is worse than Ganz.” Lord Zeron, a Lord Mage clad in gray said. That erupted another round of wild arguments. Lord Daron closed his eyes in despair, gripping the podium. weeks of hard work, vanishing like ash falling through the fingers.
“How can we save this?” he whispered to himself.
“How can we save this?” He shouted out to the hall.
“If they win we must teach them a lesson!” one Lord said.
“Yes, Clearly they have forgotten the power of Aku’anda!” another said.
“If they lose?” Lord Kardo said.
“We must immediately distance ourselves from their foolishness!” Lord Zeron said.
“Ganz will be furious. He will attack Sungan, We will NOT interfere.” Lord Fugap said.
“One of us must go.” Lord Daron said. Suddenly deciding to go there himself to see, to do something, anything to save this mess.
“It will take days to get there!” Lord Kardo said.
“Not if a war mage carries me.” Lord Daron said.
“With the speed?” Lord Fugap said. “You don’t care for your aging bones?”
“All of our bones will be burned to ashes if we let those animals launch a full scale war!” Lord Daron retorted.
The hall fell into silence.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“I will go.” He said and left the hall entirely, the sound that erupted from it dissolving into an unintelligible cacophony as he moved out to the street with Regar.
“Regar, I trust you have the speed.” Lord Daron said.
“Yes, Lord Daron.” Regar said. “But I fear for your health. The speed is rough.”
Lord Daron put a hand on Regar’s shoulder. “Captain Rodo Carried the Queen of Pirun with speed, she is a decade older than I am. I will be fine.”
Regar nodded and Lord Daron hopped on his back. Regar held on to his legs and he held on to Regar, wrapping his arms around Regar’s chest.
Regar took a deep breath and focused on the road. He invoked the speed, an ingenious spell, only a few decades old, that allowed mages to both move at superhuman speeds and endurance, cushioning them against the immense forces that would otherwise break every bone in their bodies.
The spell ignited and as the paper burned and smoke wafted into the sky, a thin film of energy, very small amount of it, formed and wrapped around Regar and Daron like a thin layer of clear oil, The Spell Dampener around Aku’anda immediately began to siphon it, causing it to chill against their skin.
Regar took another deep breath, and in a split second, bolted.
--
Lakan decided to get a bit bolder and move closer to the raging battle so he could observe what was happening more closely. He brought out one of his numerous copies of speed spells, already bound to paper, bringing out an ink, he added a few more runes to make a new spell - a shock absorber. He invoked it and a thick film of energy immediately surrounded him. He moved close to one of the merlons on the wall battlements and punched it. As his punch moved closer to the stone, the film around him compressed and his hand bounced away harmlessly from the merlon. Confident in his new spell, he made for the battle.
A few minutes later, he began to see the path the battle had passed through. There were smoking bodies, alive and dead, coughing and injured people with broken legs, arms, and parts of their skin torn off or burned. There were broken buildings, some torn entirely in half like paper. Healers were scrambling around to get people help, Many of the injured couldn’t hear what the healers were saying.
He already agreed with Aku’anda’s diplomatic stance on Ganz, but if anything, seeing this grotesque scene made him agree even more. He continued to press on.
Soon he got close to the war and started to hear voices. He hid inside houses, now long abandoned by fleeing people, moving from house to house as the battle moved rapidly back and forth, carried out on rooftops.
He could make out General Makon’s voice, screaming for victory and the crushing of the enemy.
Looking closely, he noticed both sides were launching field spells, that was what was causing the massive shockwaves that were tearing apart buildings.
Just above him, a Sungan Mage pulled one of the Pirun Defenders towards him with a gravity spell, The exact spell Ganz had been rumored to use, the Sungan implementation was crude. The target was pulled, but so were a few roof pieces and bricks.
The target, now clearly identifiable as one of the initial invaders Rodo had described, deployed a field spell of his own that interacted with the gravity spell.
Both spells reacted and exploded in a massive shockwave that penetrated even Lakan’s thick absorbing armor and reverbated in his bones, moving further to crack the house he was hiding out in, ripping out part of the roof.
He cursed for not having battle ready armor. This was a terrible makeshift, up above, the Sungan mage had fired a massive fireball at the Pirun Defender, who responded with a glistening green defence ball that expanded slowly from him, pushing back the fireball until it fizzled out.
As the Sungan Mage prepared to launch his next move, a piece of iron from the roof of the house he was standing on ripped out and flew straight into the Sungan mage. Stabbing him through.
Lakan looked around, The target the Sungan mage was fighting was a decoy, The other Defender had been trying to figure out his shield mechanism, once that had happened, he was stabbed through with a magically altered piece of iron that had been propelled with field magic.
This was a real war.
Lakan switched houses to remain hidden and took a deep breath. His breath was interrupted with the thud of the lifeless body of the Sungan mage hitting the streets just outside the window of the room he was in.
Less than a minute later, the Sungans scored their own win. A lifeless defender, burned beyond recognition, fell to the street a few meters away from the first body. Lakan decided he’d had enough. He slinked away from the battle, creeping from house to house as blast after blast shook his bones after penetrating his absorbing spell.
Three houses away, the air suddenly felt cold, Lakan could feel it through his armor spell and he crossed into another deserted building and tried to get a good look at the fighting wizards who were now a distance away.
Then he saw him, An extremely furious Ganz, who had cast a wide field spell to pull heat and was quite literally suctioning it into a rapidly growing ball of white heat floating on both of his outstretched palms, walking towards the slowly retreating Sungan Mages while his defenders circled around him, blocking off attacks