A battle rages across the outskirts of Vedan City between a large contingent of Night’s End members and White Tempest. Lyzian effortlessly dances across the field, evading every blow at the last possible minute. “You almost had me there. Do you want me to stop moving so you guys have a chance?” He stops in the middle of the yellow grassland and allows himself to be surrounded. “If you guys can hit me, I”ll show you something really good.”
“Stop wasting time.” Lyzian looks behind him and sees a golden brown skinned woman with golden coils rise from his shadow. She has on a sleeveless, backless white top and pants similar to Lyzian’s. A large, storm grey sash with the symbol of White Tempest covers the middle of her shirt to the top of her pants. “You said you’d be good if I let you come on assignment.”
“Kusierda! You know I hate when you shadowlock me Jiya.”
“I wouldn’t have to if you didn’t charge in by yourself,” Jiya responds. Her golden, cat eyes glint as they shift to their normal, circular shape. “I’m taking over.”
“But-” Lyzian sees Jiya’s hands grow claws and swell to three times their size. “Well, you heard the wife,” Lyzian says as he turns to the encircling army, “I’ll just be over here.”
Jiya’s muscles expand as she enters into her chimerized state. Her irises turn into that of a hylin’s; three triangular irises that move independently of one another. She crouches down and sticks her hands out parallel to the ground. “If you all stand down, I won’t harm any of you. You know who I am and what I can do, you stand no chance here.”
An armored Gladius of Night’s End charges towards Jiya with his sword drawn. Before he can swing his blade, Jiya swipes her clawed hands across his midsection and separates it from his body. The claws of the hylin are able to pierce through stone without being ather infused; for a Gladius like Jiya, a human body is nothing more than paper.
“I’ll give you one more chance,” Jiya says as she returns to her previous stance, “leave here and never return to Vedan City.” The army pauses for a moment but then charges at her, screaming the mantra of Night’s End. Jiya rips through the first wave in a dance of claws and blood. The sound of metal being ripped open fills the air, followed by the scream of dozens. She becomes a blur in the battle, making her way through her prey with ruthless efficiency.
Lyzian sits on the ground and watches her with his head on his palm. “How long has it been since you’ve pulled that one out? 10? 15 years?”
Jiya runs her hand through the chest of an enemy. “I only use it when it’s necessary.”
Lyzian gestures to the sea of lifeless bodies around them. “You thought it was necessary for these guys? There were only a few of them.”
“There were 70,” Jiya says as she assumes her regular form, “ and if you would have just taken it seriously…”
“Come on, you expect me to take a bunch of fleas seriously? I can’t even understand why we were sent this in the first place.” Lyzian stands up and walks over to Jiya, “We should have sent this to Adelie, I’m sure he would have loved this.”
“He’s already on a mission. In the Caisin Islands, like his letter said,” Jiya says as she walks past Lyzian towards Vedan City.
“Oh yeah, an escort mission. That’s boring, what kind of enemies would he even face there? All the strong beasts are north of Unam.”
Jiya smiles, “Sometimes I forget that White Tempest would be nothing but a beast hunting guild if you had it your way. Now come on, the client is waiting for us and we need to report this to the Council. A banned guild trying to seize Vedan City isn’t something we can just ignore.” Jiya starts once more towards Vedan City when one of the mangled corpses starts twitching.
“Jiya,” Lyzian says warningly.
“I know, I can feel it too.”
The corpse slowly rises onto its feet but stumbles taking its first step and falls face first into the ground, making a loud clang as its helmet collides with the armor of another.
“I thought you killed that one,” Lyzian says as he reaches for his blade.
“Last I checked, ramming my claws through the heart was a pretty effective way of killing someone,” Jiya replies as she assumes her chimerized hylin form.
Another corpse rises from the ground.
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“There’s something going on with their bodies,” Jiya says as her visual acuity increases, “there’s an engraving on them.” On the exposed torso of one of the corpses is a violet mark. “ It’s covered by the armor so I can’t tell what it is.”
Five more corpses rise from the ground and shamble towards them, but stop. They howl as ather erupts from their body in a wave of black and violet energy, blowing away the stationary bodies.
“Lyzian, their ather is visible now...and it feels wrong.” Jiya starts to prepare for another fight but sees Lyzian step forward.
“You go ahead and talk to the client, I’ll deal with this.” Lyzian continues walking, his hand on the golden hilt of his blade.
It would be pointless to argue with him at this point, years of being with him told Jiya that. “Just be sure to aim your attacks away from the city, we can’t afford to rebuild another one.” She darts towards Vedan City with blinding speed, but a corpse appears next to her and slashes at her neck.
Lyzian blocks the attack with his sword as Jiya continues towards the city. He pushes the corpse back with enough force to send it back several feet with one swing. The rest of the corpses scream the mantra of Night’s End in distorted voices and channel more ather, causing the ground beneath them to crack. Each one summons their weapons to the hands.
“Well that’s interesting,” Lyzian says with a smile creeping onto his face, “ first you guys put out enough ather to make it visible, and now you can summon weapons. If I’d known you could do that, I wouldn’t have let Jiya step in.” Lyzian sheathes his blade; a long white sword with blue lighting etched down the length in the center. The grey in his eyes glow as his ather flows from his body. “Well what are you waiting for?”
The corpses move towards him with unnatural speed but from their movements alone, Lyzian could tell they were adjusting to their bodies as if it were the first time they were using them. He digs his back foot into the ground and rockets towards them, drawing his sword in one fluid motion. It collides with the weapon of one of the corpses and a shockwave splits the ground. A blade moves towards Lyzian’s neck but is parried at the last moment. “You’re getting faster,” Lyzian says as he dodges an attack from behind, “and your strategies aren’t half bad, but you’ll have to do better if you want to keep me entertained.” Lyzian slashes his sword horizontally and a powerful gust of wind blows them all away. “ I hope this wasn’t the extent of your abilities!”
Only six of the corpses rise up this time. They look at the motionless one on the floor and say in distorted unison: “We drown our weaknesses.” The corpses descend into a free for all, attacking each other with blind fervor as Lyzian looks on. They continue killing each other until only one remains. It reaches its hand out and touches one of the corpses. Something surges through its body and ather explodes arounds it. The corpse repeats this six more times before turning to Lyzian. “You, you were with the one that killed us.”
“So you can speak now? And so clearly too. What happened to broken phrases from before?”
“Move out of our way, we must have our revenge,” the corpse says. Ather erupts from it like an inferno, shaking the very ground beneath it.
“If you’re strong enough to make me move, then why are you asking?” Lyzian sheathes his blade again and zips towards the corpse. This time, when he moves to unsheathe it, the corpse places its hand on top of Lyzians and pushes him backwards. Lyzian looks down at his blade and then back at the corpse. “You were able to stop my attack before it happened. Looks like whatever you did made you a bit better.”
“We have the power of 7 Gladius within this one,” the corpse says, “you are only one.”
Lyzian grins and draws his sword. His ather erupts around him to match that of the corpse. “7 Gladius? You almost got my hopes up.” The corpse explodes towards Lyzian with all of its power aimed at killing him. “ Still, you did make me use my blade and managed to stop an attack, so I’ll show you something good.” Lyzian brings his sword arm across his body and swings it in an upward,diagonal arc. Crackles of lighting dances off his blade as a hurricane force of wind rips through the corpse and splits the ground and clouds in half. “Borrowed that from a woman named Zorya, but you won’t tell her, right?”
The corpse falls to the ground in two halves and erodes into a puddle of an unknown black substance. Lyzian looks at the puddle and places the tip of his blade on its surface. It latches on the blade and starts to grow in size until a powerful current of electricity vaporizes it. “It was feeding off my ather, but only in its raw form.” Lyzian sends an arc of electricity to the puddle and destroys it. He looks past the puddle and sees the trail of destruction caused by his attack. “Well, Jiya said not to destroy the town, she didn’t say anything about changing the landscape.” He looks back at the blackened spot that was once the corpse. “Jiya, I’m sure you caught all of that.”
“Of course,” Jiya says as she reappears from his shadow. “ I think we were set up, Lyzian.”
“What do you mean?”
“The client was dead when I got there. From the looks of it, they’ve been dead for at least a week give or take,” Jiya says.
“So all of this was to get us out here?”
“Perhaps, or to keep us away from something. I don’t know, I need time to investigate.”
“You do that, “ Lyzian says, “and don’t tell the Council. If someone is coming after White Tempest, then White Tempest will handle it.”
Jiya shrugs, “Fine, but you’re going to have to do the paperwork then.”
“Wait, that’s not our arrangement,” Lyzian protests.
Jiya walks up to him, pulls him down towards her and kisses him. “It’s not?”
“Ok I’ll do it, but not until we figure out all of this. Let’s head back to White Tempest.” Lyzian turns to walk and sees Jiya not moving. “What’s wrong?”
“What happened here?” Jiya asks pointing to the split earth beneath her, “Lyzian, did you use a bladecraft?”
“Only a low level one,” Lyzian replies. He sees the anger building in Jiya, “Actually, I’m gonna get a headstart on that paperwork. You go start the investigation.” Before Jiya can say another word, electricity arcs from Lyzian’s body and he disappears in an instant.