Should I even bother to describe Kilren's Cove?

What would anybody expect from the residence of ogre-kin like Greslock, anyway? Most of their tables lay shattered in pools of shimmering blood and beer, seeping into the cracks of the dark tile floor. Lifeless clouds of dust and mold drift through the air, surely contributing to the wretched, festering stench of the place, though the unwashed ogres themselves contributed the rest, each of them hulking and bare, wearing not much more than leather battle-garments and bandoliers with old scars and fresh wounds covering their hideous bodies.

Needless to say, it wasn't a place that a Hunter should show up in, nor any sane creature for that matter…

He was nearly toppled as one of the creatures stormed in from behind him, carelessly knocking past his body. He glared up into the cold gaze of the ogre’s black-red eyes. A smirk grew across his dark green lips.

“Watch where you're going. Or I'll pluck those useless eyes from your skull.” Cedric hissed, pulling his hood down from his head. The small crowd of the tavern continued to chatter around them.

The ogre let out a low growl and inflated his chest to make a show of his size.

Cedric scoffed. "Threatening me, too?"

The ogre guffawed and licked his lips. "Big talk, this one has."

"Oy," Kilren's silhouette groaned from behind the counter, the hearth glowing at his back. "Leave the boy alone. We've had enough fights today."

"Oh? Ain't no fight, it'd be murder."

It's certainly going to be… he thought, rubbing his finger across the crystal in his pocket. "I'm inclined to agree with Kilren. Leave the boy alone."

The ogre leaned in close to exhale warm steam against Cedric's face. "Or what?"

"Or I promise that your life ends here." he muttered. He felt an uncanny shift in the air as his magic gemstone began the contract. The leylines went untouched. He shivered at that.

"Now you’re talking!” The giant moved his hand to the hilt of the weapon on his back.

Cedric smirked, sealing the deal and completing the spell.

The ogre tore his axe free from his side and swept it in a magnificent arc. Cedric grasped the crystal.

But the spell hadn’t completed. And the axe closed the distance quickly.

Cedric fell fast and hit the tiles. The axe bit into the door where he had once stood.

A voice caught his attention. He glanced around but no face matched it.

Just as the ogre raised his axe again, Kilren, darker-skinned and hairier than the others, appeared from behind the counter and deflected the attack with his own massive axe. Sparks shot across Cedric like flames.

“Down. Olck‘ta na gresh.” Kilren spat in another tongue.

“Bala? Fie kar.” The ogre protested.

Kilren snorted and the negotiation ended. Then, he turned to Cedric and offered him a hand. His eyes traced the new indent in the door with disdain. “You pick fights everywhere you go?”

“I’m usually a pacifist.” He helped himself up.

“Ain’t we all?” The ogre scoffed.

Cedric tossed his satchel down beside the messy, cornered bed in the dark room upstairs. He clenched his nose as he turned to inspect the black mold scattered all over the blade-battered walls. The floorboards crackled and crunched with every step, instead of the almost nostalgic creaking that he would have expected, even preferred from an inn.

But not from an ogre's inn…

He clumsily threw his sword down onto his satchel and began to strip away his leather kit. His bandolier and jacket came off easily enough, but he paused before his shirt, turning to scowl at the plate of muddy mush that Kilren had delivered to his room, still sitting on the floor beside the door.

As if I’d eat that… Hoax or not, I should have gone for roast gryphon…

The crystal! He gasped, suddenly sent frenzying through his discarded armor. His hands ripped through the leather kit and dug desperately through his satchel. He panted and choked, a horrific wind of anxiety striking him like lightning.

It dropped to the floor with an unceremonious thud as he lifted up his leather jacket again. He lunged upon it immediately.

The crystal's surface pulsed and swirled with a strange vibrancy, humming in a familiar tone… Or growling…

He turned to the door quickly. His heart pounded. “Who’s there?”

Cedric gagged and choked, grasping at his throat as the voice boomed again through his skull.

The door to the shabby, fire-lit tavern suddenly shot open, carried by a fierce gust of wind. The whole building rocked and creaked, struggling to survive what was quickly becoming an apparent snowstorm.

“Someone get that door shut,” Kilren ordered, preoccupied with scrubbing blood from his counter using a stained rag. “That bastard upstairs is trouble enough, we don’t need the whole damn blizzard—”

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His eyes froze upon the dark, mangled figure standing in the doorway. It slid toward him as though it hovered, its disfigured and misshapen body concealed by a long black robe.

Disappointment. Horror. Undeserved agony. The floor creaked with every slight movement it made until it arrived at the counter. Then all was silent except for its voice, riding upon their sheltered breaths: “Kilren’s Cove, yes?”

The wind creaked, scratching against the furniture. A thin, bandaged arm extended from beneath the robes, tapped a long, charred finger onto the counter.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap...

The few ogre-kin in the place shuffled uneasily. Kilren cast a few nervous glances at his patrons. “W-What can I do for ya?”

“I’m here to take care of the child upstairs, as any good sandman should… It seems he’s taken a liking to a certain… Relistar…” the walls creaked.

Kilren twitched suddenly, an unusual, uncontrollable fear crawling over him. He gestured Cedric’s room number with his fingers, nodded to the strange robed thing ahead of him. The empty robes nodded back, silently hovering toward the splintered staircase that rose above the bar.

He paused suddenly. Without moving, the creaking of the whole house began again. “But the grim appearance of your fairytale poppart shall not operate without a name… Unless, have I mistaken this universe for another? No matter. You may call me King Algirak.”

Kilren shuddered again. The patrons breathed heavy and fast with their eyes shut, trying their best to resist the unruly fear that had broken forcibly into their minds.

King Algirak the Intangible had come.

Algirak turned to the stairs again. Kilren watched him tensely, holding his breath. The silence only grew heavier as the candles dimmed. It was as if he didn’t quite exist. Or shouldn’t.

The lights flickered out and then returned. Algirak had vanished. Kilren panted slightly. He clutched his chest.

“S-shut that door.” he finally mustered. Though, even with the door open, there was no wind to cause his shiver. And he could be certain it was not from the cold, for the burning fire behind him kept him swamped with warmth.

Caloria’s end, he’s here!

Cedric cried out, endless sweat glistening across his skin in the dim candlelight. The crystal’s fire burned into his hand. His heart boomed deafeningly through his aching skull.

He pulled back to throw the scorching crystal away, but his mind forced it back into safety within his clenched fist.

Damn, damn, damn! the curses echoed through his head. The crystal glowed brighter and brighter, soon illuminating the room with its red flame.

The calm, slow rapping began at the door.

The Relistar burned again, forcing Cedric to his knees. He could hear a voice, feel an energy gently prodding the edges of his psyche.

“No—” he gasped, collapsing into his end table. The candle fell to the floor. Its brass holder clattered noisily.

“Ah, I can hear you… Serkukan…” scratched the door.

The fire from the candle vanished and the Relistar suddenly seemed to glow even brighter. Cedric’s eyes rolled over. His skin turned pale as he began to faint.

“Yes, yes,” the door finally squeaked open, “Evra’s bastard child and her firstborn, finally reunited… How long has it been? A decade? Longer?”

Algirak clicked each of his knuckles against the door, carefully scanning every inch of the room with the purple-glowing marbles hidden beneath his hood.

“Our last encounter has disfigured me, brother… The blisteringly red rage that you set upon me has shattered my once pristine form, courtesy of Llestren’s Relistar. But no matter; he’s patiently set to await his demise in the north, just as quickly as I can get there… Once we all converge for our final encounter, that traitorous dog will be shown what it is to be punished.

He’s betrayed us, don’t you see? We were one, brothers in Etheria, before this outsider came in… Twisted our fates against each other, into the helix of distrust and spite that we struggle through now… I still see our true natures, through all of his lies and deceit… You’re not a pawn of Azafel like that bastard. Once you see through it, once you reach up to strike him down… We’ll converge again. The Supernova, Algirak and Serkukan, together at last… And we shall both reap the benefits of Dyosius. Eternity across the multiverse shall be ours to conquer, and our black-red mimicry of Azafel will be our weapon to destroy him…”

He stood for a brief pause, letting the silent suspense fall upon the empty room. Before a minute had passed, he continued. “Take your time, Serkukan. Until Llestren finds you, or you find him, your fate is in your own hands. But that spawn of Azafel is a disease, waiting to obliterate whatever power we yet wield. I beg of you Serkukan; this is your choice. Make the right one. But know that with or without you, I’ll strike down this deceiver. It’s merely up to you whether you rule with me—or die against me.”

Cedric’s consciousness struck back into his mind just as the door clicked shut. His body reemerged from the warping, moving floor, which he had sank into to hide.

He gasped, “W-what was that? What did you just—”

“But what—it was as if—” he scrambled for words, his head aching.

Cedric’s heart sank.

“Serkukan? Algirak? They’re Sylvet legends—they’re… they’re not real, there’s no way—”

His lips suddenly fused shut.

Cedric grasped his skull, silently screaming out as a beautiful titanium crystal materialized within his mind, its glossy surface swirling with a rainbow spectrum of churning colors.

Cedric continued his muffled screaming until his lips finally unfused, replacing his desperate wails with terrified whispers. “W-we can’t! Not there, I’ll die—”

Cedric filled with horror as the voice became the loud cackle of an unhinged demon.

And then came a wave of lethargy over Cedric; Serkukan’s theft of his emotions, to turn him into a mindless, thoughtless pawn.

He collapsed without another word as Serkukan compelled his body into obedience.

And Serkukan had nothing left to say, but to sit and growl curses at Llestren'vatis for giving him such a spineless pawn in the first place...

*