Grraaaahhhh!!!! Noxus yelled as he swung the massive double bladed great axe into the flesh of the undead minion in front of him. He was exhausted from the many battles he and his men had been through to get to this point. Behind him he could hear the cry of his best friend and right-hand man, Nigel. Sparing a quick look back he could see that one of the countless undead had speared him through his left thigh while he was engaged with another.
“Are you alright?” He yelled back towards his comrade focusing back on the undead still in front of him.
“I’ll be fine, Mother.” Nigel called back sarcastically as he used his shield to force back the opponents around him.
They were the only two left of his army still alive, but they couldn’t give up. Too much, and too many lives depended on them defeating the lich king. The undead horde had gone unnoticed for too long and had been able to grow to unimaginable numbers. Noxus and his men had pushed the horde back for days on end, but there seemed to be no end to their numbers. He was weary and for what seemed like the hundredth time wondered if it was all worth it or if he should just give up and let the king deal with the problem his indolence had caused in the first place. When a skeleton swung an old rusted great sword toward his face he decided to leave his idle thoughts to the wayside and focus back on the task at hand. They were so close to the liches throne room where they could finally put an end to the madness that was this endless battle and bury their friends. Just a few more undead littered the halls between the two friends and the final door, just a little longer and they could rest, whether it be in death or victory.
With a quick step back and to left Noxus used the momentum of his sharp turn and swung his great axe through the last two undead minions attacking him, cleaving them in two at a slightly downward angle the rusted heavy armor not providing enough of a barrier to stop his massive strength and the leverage his nearly 8-foot frame could provide. As a child he had been hailed a giant in his small parish and had been trained as a berserker from the age of 7 always being pushed to grow stronger and more resilient.
As he finished his turn facing back toward Nigel he planted his feet and leaped forward to help his friend finish off the last two of the undead minions. He took the undead spearman by surprise with a massive overhead chop borrowing the power of gravity and his own weight to split his opponent in two from head toe.
Upon seeing his friend leap towards the spear man Nigel gave up on defending and instead pressed his attack on the remaining minion bashing his shield into the revenant causing it to stumble backward. Flowing forward with a speed and grace unexpected of a warrior in heavy armor he brought his sword up from under the cover of his shield and through the arm of the revenant separating body and limb, then continuing his momentum with a full 360 spin decapitated the revenant in a single clean swipe.
“About time you contributed something to the fight, I thought I was going to have to kill them all myself.” Noxus jibbed.
“It’s not my fault your oversized body and that hunk of metal you call an axe takes up all the room in here. How am I supposed to get close enough to kill them while your fat ass is in my way?” Nigel replied
“Hahaha.” Both men laughed at the running banter between them which no one else seemed to understand.
“Are you ready for one last battle my brother?” Noxus asked walking toward the door to what would be the fight to decide if the kingdom of Shintol would survive or become an undead waste land.
“As ready as one can be with no sleep or food for two days straight.” He replied wearily following at his companions’ side.
“Oh, quit your complaining grandma.” Noxus jested “What’s the use of a little rest when you have the incessant moaning of the undead to keep you awake, alert, and ready for battle?”
“Battle obsessed Barbarians.” Nigel hissed under his breath with his usual cocky smirk.
When they arrived at the door, they could faintly hear the impossibly deep voice of the lich grating through the otherworldly syllables in the language of magic raising up more undead that the two would have to contend with before they could silence the lich. Knowing that they had no more time to waste the companions lowered their shoulders and rammed through the door in their way. The first thing they noticed when they arrived inside the throne room through the sporadic light shining in the windows of the throne room, once ornately decorated with flags and banners was now decrepit and time worn almost as if this was the ruins of a long-forgotten fortress, was that everything from the throne itself to the brackets meant to hold torches on the wall to the rugs on the pavestone floor was rusted and tattered. If they didn’t know better, they would have thought this place hadn’t been habited for centuries, but it was a side effect of the eldritch magic used by the lich to reanimate the corpses of its army, which has the unfortunate side effect of corrupting everything around it as well as its user.
At that point Noxus realized that the decor was not the most important thing for them to be focused on now. ‘Something is missing he thought.’ The eerie silence and palpable fear in the air was causing his thoughts to wander away from what should be on his and his companions mind. He realized then that the lich had cast a distraction spell of some sort with a mental slap to his consciousness he snapped back to the present and found himself and Nigel were surrounded by skeletal archers, blade wielding revenants, as well as a couple zombies strewn around in the mix for good measure, and there sitting on the decrepit throne eyes glowing a sickly green was the lich. A gaunt, almost skeletal, man sat in midnight black robes with arcane symbols along the chest and arms that seemed to almost writhe with the same sickly green eldritch light. On the skin not covered by the robes he could see he had scars and weeping sores covering his bald head and his hands, so thin one could see the bones clearly through the skin, with his nails filed down to resemble the claws of a predator grasping a gnarled and twisted staff with an onyx crystal sitting in a crook near the top.
The lich smiled at him with teeth a rotten yellow while he slowly raised his hand and in the same impossibly deep voice bellowed “Fire.”
Noxus turned and leapt toward Nigel tackling him out of the way of the first volley of arrows the thrummed from the bows of the skeletal archers. Rolling from his comrade Noxus jumped up and waded into the oncoming forces of undead swinging his great axe in tight circles carving through bodies left and right to keep them from getting to Nigel before he was able to stand and fend for himself. “Nigel snap out of it I can’t keep all the fun for myself. Get off your lazy ass and fight.”
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The voice of his brother and the jolt from being tackled breaking the hold the magic had on him Nigel rolled to his stomach shaking his head as he scrambled to his feet. He was able to get standing before he was overwhelmed by the undead and called out “I’m fine, go for the lich I can take these weaklings even while lying on the ground.”
With his brother back up and fighting off the undead behind him Noxus started to push forward killing undead with every step as he made his way ever closer to the evil lich, who was the cause of all the bloodshed and misery in the past 4 months. After it had called for its minions to attack the two warriors the lich had stood, raising his staff, and began casting again. As the unearthly words fell from the mouth of the lich the eldritch light began to swirl around his body creeping up his arms and onto the staff. The magic condensed in to the form of three daggers swirling around the crystal becoming more tangible as the words continued to emerge from its sputtering maw. With a last arcane word, the lich thrust the top of his staff forward toward Noxus, who had been slowly making his way closer and closer toward the lich with a bloodthirsty grin, causing the three magical daggers to shoot at him.
Noxus saw the spell shooting toward him and reached out a hand grabbing one of the many revenants by the neck. Using the body of his newly acquired friend as a shield he threw the revenant at the incoming daggers stopping two but missing the third. He dove out of the way crashing into three other enemies in the process. Tangled in the limbs of the undead he took a couple of hits collecting new scratches and bruises before he was able to get back to his feet and continue his was in the direction of the lich. While he was in a slight lull between opponents he just happened to look toward the body of the undead he used as a shield, but instead of seeing a body with daggers protruding from the abdomen all he saw was a bubbling and steaming puddle of blood and acid. He couldn’t help but thank the gods above that he had managed to escape unscathed from that particular spell.
Noxus focused back on getting to the lich stepping a little faster and swinging a little harder to minimize the time the lich had for casting spells.
The lich yelled for the archers to drop their bows and instead move forward to impede the warrior almost upon him. It knew that its greatest advantage was the magic that it could cast, and that it stood no chance of victory if the berserker made it in range to use the massive hunk of metal it called an axe. Again, starting a spell, it slowly shuffled backwards extending the range that the berserker would have to cover in order to reach it. The eldritch glow again surrounding the magic staff a dark glow started to pulse within the crystal. Speaking as fast as it was able to without muddling up the spell, the lich slammed the staff down with both hand causing a massive “Booooomm” and cracks to appear in the paved floor. As the last word dropped, again seeming to pulse with a sense of weight that no words should have, the magic that gathered around the staff began to leak into the cracks in the floor that the lich had just made. Nothing seemed to happen for a few breaths until with another audible crack several small vines started sprouting out of the gaps in the stone. They quickly began to grow in both length and width all the while increasing in number and spreading out in a protective circle around the lich. After they completely encircled the lich the vines began to harden and grow thorns that oozed with an unknown black substance that smelled heavily of death and decay.
Seeing the liches protective measures getting bigger Noxus decided to pick up the pace even more. While the speed that he moved forward increased he had to sacrifice his defense to accomplish this, receiving more cuts and bruises along the way.
When he finally arrived at the outer edge of the protective thicket he immediately started hacking at the base of what was now several inch-thick hardened vines. Using his massive strength to force his axe through the vines for a couple of swings before he was forced to turn and deal with the undead that had arrived behind him. One jab and three quick slices later he was once again free to hack away at the thicket that was between him and the lich. Every hack causing the lich to expend more mana keeping the thicket alive.
In a last-ditch effort to stay alive the lich dismissed his protective spell and started yelling out his fastest offensive spell a bolt of dark energy that caused a slight amount of damage but more importantly caused a temporary blindness in who it struck. “BLAGHT UN DANTICHE BLUNDITCH” thrusting out it thin frail looking hand it cast the bolt of darkness toward Noxus.
After the thicket was cut off from the magic keeping it alive the thorn riddled vines began to wither and decay, falling to dust around Noxus giving him a final clear shot at the evil creature in front of him. With a frustrated yell he started sprinting towards the lich as it uttered yet another spell. Seeing the bolt of darkness appearing in the hand of the lich Noxus slid forward only just avoiding the missile. Coming back up from his slide Noxus used his momentum to bring his axe up severing the arm holding the staff then with a quick turn brought the axe back down into the shoulder of the lich splitting him from shoulder to mid chest.
All the remaining undead surrounding Noxus and Nigel fell as if marionettes who had their strings cuts. No longer having access to the magic that kept them animated. Turning toward Nigel to make sure his brother was alright Noxus smiled wearily. “We are finally rid of this blasted blight on the land. Now we can get some rest and mourn the death of the comrades.”
“Its about time you finished playing with that disgusting creature, I thought I was going to have to come and finish the fight for you. Did you stop for food in the middle of battle again?”
“That was one time and I told you I didn’t stop I had the biscuit in my belt pouch and I hadn’t eaten breakfast because someone decided not to wake me on time after my watch.” Noxus shot back accusingly.
Walking up to his friend Nigel looked around him at the lich laying on the ground soaking the ground in its black blood and said, “It is not my job to be your mother you overgrown toddler. You are a grown man you can damn well wake your… NNNOOOOOOO!!!!!”
In the middle of their banter Nigel had felt something was wrong and looking again at the lich he saw the mouth moving and felt the pressure of the eldritch magic building to an immense level cracks showing in the skin of its face as the magic was overloading the system of the lich. Without a second thought Nigel grabbed a hold on Noxus’ shoulder and threw his friend beneath him onto the ground with all his strength covering him with his body and shield.
“BBBOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!”
A massive explosion rocked the throne room, a searing heat burned through both friends melting the shield on top of Nigel. Screaming at the top of his lungs Nigel was slowly burned and torn by the force of the explosion. All the while Noxus was under him trying desperately to move his brother in arms out of the direct force of the blast, to instead protect his friend, to share in the pain, but Nigel was fueled by a desperate strength to save his comrades life and would not be moved.
Noxus felt as if an eternity was passing while he listened to the best friend, no the best man he had ever known scream until his throat was so ragged and bloody all that could come out was a coughing gurgle. When the explosion was finally over, only a couple of seconds had passed, Nigel’s strength gave out and Noxus was able to move his friend off him. Rolling his friend off him Noxus opened his eyes to see how badly his friend was hurt and if there was anyway that he could be saved. Well that’s what he tried to do but his eyes wouldn’t obey him, reaching up with his hand to feel what was keeping his eyes from opening, but all he felt were his eyelids hanging over holes where his eyes used to be. All of a sudden, the pain hit him. Crying out “AAAHHHHHH” Noxus fainted, the sudden explosion of the pain from his eyes as well as all the pain his accumulated during the fight hit him at once, his tired mind couldn’t take it