COMBAT ENCOUNTER: CORGI + ELF WARRIOR (GLENHEIM) VS ELVEN ASSASSIN (SEEDED)

RESULTS: CORGI + ELF WARRIOR VICTORY

[Core Skill Increases]

[Blink] LVL 6*

[Versatile Dig] LVL 6*

[Repulsive Bark] LVL 5

Effective Range: 35ft

Cooldown: 5 -> 3 hrs

*[Core Skills (Dig), (Blink) RELENTLESS attribute unlocked]

A skill with the {RELENTLESS} attribute can reset its cooldown immediately once every 24 hours.

SYNERGY unlocked: [Lightning Storm]

[Glittering Thrust] + Mag Effect

The first thing I feel when I wake up and shake off all these onyx letters is fire.

Glenheim burns.

We’ve landed just outside the grove, its entrance being nothing now but a scorched pieces of earth behind the waterfall, and all I can see around me is the chaos of a battlefield. Wooden beams from bridges crumble to the ground, the great walls of the stronghold are being blown apart, and each once vibrant mushroom is now being slowly gnawed apart by engulfing flames.

Something screams in front of me, and only then do I see what it is: an elf.

An elf coated in the black bark of the Darkseed’s minions.

As the creature flies at me I roll aside, feeling the sting from my recent wounds when I tumble from the waterfall’s pool and watch the mindless thing paddle about like an infured animal.

Through its flailing, I see that it’s a face I recognize.

“Arthelia…”

A stroke of lightning blasts into the creature and sends it flying through the grove, Myra rising from the pond to seal the entrance with a flick of her wrist.

Now I realize that must be how we got through. Myra’s presence must have broken the seal on the grove just as Seneca’s fiery explosion knocked us out.

I step forward, watching Myra as she looks down at her shimmering blade and lets the blood from her forehead trickle down to coat its edge.

“Myra, I – that was Arthelia, wasn’t it?”

She looks back at me with a knowing glance, and manages to shake her head.

“No,” she says. “Not now. Not anymore. She’s gone. All that matters now is who is still left.”

She jerks her head up, “Raziel!”

From behind I hear more scraping of wood against the charred grass, and I spin on reflex and let my [Swallow Swipe] fly.

The azure light cleaves clean through four Seedlings that were springing at me – Seeded Goblins, this time.

I step back, panting with exertion and sorrow, both.

I don’t think I could kill them if they were elves. I don’t think…

Then again, not even these goblins chose this fate, did they?

I look down at their rotting corpses, their barkskinned faces twisted in agony as wood shavings spew like blood from their bloated bellies.

You’re just as powerless as the rest of us, aren’t you?

My musing is interrupted by Myra’s soft hands casting her spell of healing on my fur. I look from the chaos of Glenheim to her and see no sorrow painted there. Only the determination to keep going.

“It’s not the time to think,” she says, as though reading my thoughts. “it’s the time to act. Seneca’s gone, and that means our next target has to be Thorn.”

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She’s right, but I can’t help but think that this calm demeanor is just a vaneer for what she must feel bubbling beneath her heart.

Once again, her stern gaze meets my questioning eyes.

“I’m not going to turn out like her,” she says. “That’s what you told me, right? She would let fury grab her heart. But we have more than just anger to fight for.”

I tear myself away from her face to see the devastation that’s found this place. Through the edge of every wall I can see the claws of the Seedlings trying to their their way through. Another boulder smashes into the high ceiling above and brings two sets of drawbridges crashing down.

“Myra, you’re right, but –“

“HELP!”

The scream that echoes through the burning stronghold is familiar to us both. I hear it first, but it’s Myra who acts faster.

“Mia!”

We run. We run through the smoke-filled haze that’s now dominating the stronghold’s floor. Another pack of spear-wielding Seedlings lunge at us from the dark and are easily put down – I’m not stopping to play with these boys, now.

At the elevator-mushroom we ascend, and a quick [Tailcopter] takes us up from the stronghold floor to the first sets of hovels above.

“Palka!” someone shouts. “Oh, oh by the Mistress!”

It’s a crying elf whose home’s being virtually ripped apart by a swarm of Seedlings – these one’s humanoid in shape. Gangly, heads lolling side to side as they pick apart the thatched roof and send shrill cries of torment towards its inhabitants.

I twitch my paws and shout down at Myra: “Ready?”

“Together,” she agrees.

Our [Glittering Thrusts] fly from our blades and chop apart the limbs of the monsters like carving through cake. Their screaming forms jump to try and grab at us to no avail – a quick [Blink] takes me out of range and back on the way towards our destination – towards Mia’s screaming.

We see more horrors as we ascend – elves being chased by more humanoid and goblin troops, some of whom are already preparing them for Seeding by encasing them in thick vines. Others are webbed by giant spiders that dress them up like prey, cocooning them for their leader to deal with later.

We slay them all. To the last. No more elves will suffer here.

This is the one thought that’s keeping me going. Through every limb I tear from these beasts, for every head I remove from their twitching shoulders, I tell myself that it’s for the good of Glenheim. It’s what has to be done. I tell myself this is the only way we can win, here. Maybe Myra’s telling herself the same thing. But all I know is that when I cut down the sixth humanoid-shaped Seedling, I look into its dying eyes and see the terror-struck pupils of a person in there. Someone trapped within a prison of bark and twisted branches.

And it’s Myra that pulls me away.

“There!” she shouts, pointing up at the column of smoke that rises from her house. “Come on!”

Now she’s all sweat and drive, her face flushed with blood as she urges me forward and we cross the remains of the severed oak-bridge that, only yesterday, I was galivanting down without a care in this world.

Now, looking at what’s become of every house in this place, that memory seems like nothing but a dream.

When we reach Myra’s home she almost buckles – the place is nothing but rubble covered in plumes of spiralling smoke, a fire still eating away at the foundations.

But from the wreckage – another scream.

“Myra!”

She starts, moving to begin clearing the rubble, but I paw at her foot before she can start.

[Tailcopter]

The energy whipped up by my tail is enough to clear most of the smoke, and as I hover over what’s left of the house, I activate a [Snoop] on the beams covering the ground.

There – amidst the rubble – a body.

Moving – but only slightly.

“Myra – she’s –“

The girl barely lets me finish my sentence before she’s on her knees clearing that section of the house, and before long she frees Mia’s arm and grabs hold of it, dislodging the Elven girl from her prison.

“Mia, I – are you hurt? How bad is it? Here, let me help. Let me –“

Mia looks into her sister’s eyes, face covered in soot but wet with tears, and falls into her arms.

“Myra,” she whispers. “It’s over.”

Through her healing incantation, Myra shakes her head. “It’s not over. Not while the LIghtborn still breathes.”

I land beside the girls, seeing the rest of Glenheim burning all around us, and though I have to agree with Myra, it’s difficult to not see her sister’s point.

“Mia,” I say. “You have to get to safety.”

She looks at me and scoffs, cupping one hand over her forehead in despair. “And where’s that, Raz? I thought you were supposed to kill the General?”

“I tried, Mia, but –“

“You didn’t try hard enough!”

“Mia!” her sister snaps back at her. “Sis, it…it wasn’t his fault. What we thought about that villain was wrong. He’s human, pure human. It’s his mind that’s corrupted, not his body.”

Mia’s body simply wracks with sobs in response. “The same old story, then. Humans ruining our world all over again. Senecalthis?”

“Dead,” Myra states, her voice free of anger. “Killed by the treachery of her ally.”

“Just another Sister to bury.”

Mia turns and looks me dead in the eye, fury suddenly replacing her sorrow.

“Well, Lightborn?” she says with spite. “You still think we can all live in peace out there?”

To my surprise, I don’t know how to respond.

I know what I should say. I know what’s right. I know what needs to be said. But I can’t say it. Not to her. Not to that face. Not when her home is dying around her.

“Sis,” Myra says. “The Mistress – where is Palka?”

With another heave of tears, Mia collapses into her sister’s chest. It’s as good an answer as we’re likely to get, and probably tells us all we need to.

From this vantage point, looking at the burning village, the two sorrowstruck sisters, and the other Elves barely clinging to their lives, there’s another answer I suddenly arrive at.

“…it’s my fault.”

I say it without thinking, without knowing the words have even left my mouth.

Then my heart leaps.

Swiftrunner – he’s nowhere to be found.

“Raz,” Myra begins. “Don’t say –“

“Swiftrunner,” I state. “Mia – where is he?”

Something in my tone must compel her to answer. I don’t know how I sound right now. All I know is that, when I hear what she says, my feet send me rocketing back down the stronghold before my brain’s even processed the command.

“He – with – with the others,” she sobs. “When that man came…”

I don’t need to hear anymore.

“Raziel!” I hear Myra scream.

I don’t turn back. Because there’s one thing on my mind, now:

Thorn. He needs to die.