CLANG!
Commander Roy’s sword bounced off of the skelemental he had swung upon, nearly taking off his own head in the process. He cursed beneath his breath at the outcome, instincts guiding him to duck beneath the incoming retaliatory swipe from the monster.
As another pair of the beasts clawed their way up from the earth, Roy dropped his battle stance and instead opted to distance himself from the skelementals; he’d already confirmed that he’d be unable to fight them with ordinary means, so there was no point fruitlessly wailing away.
Of course, that little revelation didn’t solve the bigger problem of getting the monsters the hell out of Lunafei, all while keeping the civilians safe. Though his current selection of Ecclesian Knights were less than picture-perfect, he could rely on them to perform their duties and defend the city as best they could, so he wasn’t particularly worried about that.
What he was worried about, however, was the red-clad skelemental sitting on a throne high in the sky.
“I take it you’re the leader of this whole circus?” Roy asked.
Sinzen’s throne spun around in a half circle to better face the Ecclesian Commander, and a light chuckle escaped his….well, he didn’t have lungs nor lips, so I’m not quite sure where it came from, but you get the idea, I’m sure. “Ah! And so waltzes in the hero inevitably seeking to defy me!” His neck snapped to the side with a growl. “Where is Yunze with my drink?! They’ve thrown this take completely out the window!”
Roy felt his eyebrows arc up in curiosity. This particular skelemental was certainly the character…. “What is it you want? Tell me it’s more interesting than ‘world domination’ or ‘killing everyone just for the fun of it’.”
The masked skelemental scoffed. “World domination? There are far too many ugly, talentless individuals in this world for me to want to lay claim to them! I simply wish to put on a grand show! The grandest of shows! For I am-!”
GRAVITY!
Sinzen’s voice cut off as a sudden massive force of power surrounded him and his throne, clenching tightly and yanking him down to the earth. The throne broke through the dirt and lodged itself partly into the floor, while Sinzen found his hands locked onto the arms, unable to move.
Roy charged forward, and with a mighty roar, planted the tip of his sword into Sinzen’s eye socket. It was a more difficult shot than the other skelementals, giving his face was clad in an elaborate mask, but Roy’s combat skill was not to be trifled with, and he nailed the attack.
The blade shot through the back of Sinzen’s skull, and even pierced through the back of the throne a few inches before coming to a stop.
A moment of silence passed, and then Sinzen spoke.
“A star-making performance if I’ve ever seen one! I like you!”
Roy almost jumped away in surprise, but he held his ground, keeping a tight grip on the sword. “Thank you. I don’t like you, but I appreciate the compliment.”
Sinzen chuckled, snapping his fingers. Blindingly-bright red sparks exploded in a circle around the two, temporarily blinding Roy. When his vision returned to him, Sinzen was no longer in the throne. Instead, the skelemental was floating in the air directly above the commander, upside down.
With a sigh, Roy craned his head up, making direct eye contact with the strange skelemental. “You’re pretty obnoxious, you know that?”
“And you are being recast, Mr. Hero. Adieu!”
With another snap of his fingers, a massive hole suddenly opened beneath Roy, and he plummeted deep down into its depths….
* * * *
ULTRA KNIGHT
* * * *
Aerin similarly discovered that her conventional combat abilities would not work so cleanly on the skelementals. A pillar of flame, a chain of lightning bolts, and even a “turn physical objects into mush” spell failed to keep the monsters at bay for more than a mere second, forcing her to keep on the run.
Despite this, the mayor of Lunafei did not give in to fear, hustling through the city and utilizing her knowledge of its magical structure to carve a path to safety for herself and any and all civilians she found along the way. The trees the buildings were built into climbed higher into the sky and even rotated, keeping the entryways out of the skelementals’ reach. The crystalline branches and roots intertwined, forming gates, and the water in the streams solidified and shapeshifted into rows of jagged spikes, making them difficult to pass through, even for the seemingly indestructible skull monsters.
In almost no time, Aerin was able to make her way to the library, wherein most of the citizens had been escorted to for protection. Though there were a few faces alight with fear, overall the atmosphere was calm and composed, with the people confident in their safety.
“Do we know how they got in?” Aerin asked as she approached a circle of other city officials. None of them produced an answer, so Aerin dropped the subject, instead opting to move over to some sort of giant crystal globe, waving her hands over its surface.
The globe began to glow with blue-white light for a few moments before revealing what appeared to be an overhead view of the city. Aerin gracefully manipulated the projection, focusing on the outskirts of the city, which seemed to harbor the most amount of skelementals rising up from beneath the surface.
What caught her eye next was the thundering chariot of Sevya as it blitzed around the perimeter of the city, slamming into a crystalline tower sculpted in the likeness of spirit animals.
“They’re attacking the totems!” she announced, which caused nearly everyone else in the room to perk up in response. She was speaking of the totem poles that encircled Lunafei; they were what kept the city hidden and connected to the spirit realm. Not only that, they were also the source of the citizens’ magic abilities as well. Destroying them effectively meant destroying the city itself.
She watched as the skelemental horses leading the chariot crashed into the totem, instantly shattering it in half. Aerin’s eyes widened at how quickly the scene had played out; at this rate, the totems could all be felled within minutes.
“What should we do?” a voice asked from across the room. “Can we fight back?”
The Lunafei mayor shook her head. “No. I couldn’t even scratch those things.”
“So what are we supposed to do?”
Aerin clapped her hands together, and slowly shut her eyelids. “The only thing we can do….”
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Most of the others looked on in confusion, though one or two appeared to recognize what she was preparing to do as a holographic blue aura began to form around her body and gradually expand outward.
“I’m going to summon the Spirit Queen.”
* * * *
ULTRA KNIGHT
* * * *
The Ecclesian Knights did not have access to the same environmental manipulation magics that Aerin had, of course, but they carried out the same general plan to the best of their capabilities, escorting civilians to larger buildings and converting those into bunkers. They also tried maintaining a defensive line up front to keep the skelementals at bay, but that quickly proved beyond their means.
It was Eurus who had managed to rally them into action quickly and efficiently. Lanky and uncharismatic as he may have seemed, he performed job dutifully, and made for a pretty damn good commander in Roy’s temporary absence.
Hell, he even had the balls to rush out into the danger zone by himself, following the sounds of screaming children to escort them to safety.
It was a pair of little siblings along with their mother, trapped within the second floor of their home by a pair of snarling skelementals. At the sight of the monsters, Eurus raised his sword high and swung down, aiming to separate their skulls from their spines, only to have his blade deflected with ease.
Fumbling to put his sword back into the hilt, Eurus then gently pressed the knuckles of his fists together (the bones in his hands were sensitive; slamming them together like most ultranians did would likely cause injury).
ACCELERATE!
Glowing green light washed over his body, and enhanced his movement speed to a high degree. He used this to rush past the skelementals and scoop up one of the kids (one was already heavy enough for him; two would have been impossible), racing back outside and repeating the process for the second child.
Unfortunately, the mother was too heavy for him to carry. She was a tiny woman not much larger than her children, really, but Eurus simply could not lift her on his own. Instead, he had to use his speed to guide her past the skelementals, making sure not to move too quickly, lest he potentially snap her bones by jerking her around too suddenly.
With the family trio reunited outside the house, Eurus turned off his Accelerate Install, and, whilst breathing incredibly heavily, pointed his hand towards the inn. “G-go to the inn….It’s….safe….there….”
The mother nodded her head in thanks and grabbed her children’s hands before scurrying off towards the specified location. Eurus, in the meantime, doubled over, chest heaving as his lungs grasped for air. As a Frame, having a weak body could be a major drag; using Installs for even a few seconds could cause him to ache all over, rob him of his breath, and even make him start to break out in hives.
He didn’t have long to rest, though, with the skelementals so close by, and had to begin marching back to the inn on his own before he could fully recover. For the most part, it turned out okay; there weren’t any other skelementals on his way back.
But just before he could reach the door, a voice, soft yet attention-grabbing, like whispers from multiple people coming from all directions simultaneously, hit his ear. “You are weak.”
He spun around in a circle, grabbing for his sword. It took him a few tries before he was able to successfully retrieve it from the hilt, and by then, his forehead was drenched in sweat.
Standing (or floating, rather) before him was a tiny little skelemental, clad in a colorful hooded cloak, staring him directly in the eyes. Yunze.
“S-stay back….” he warned in his monotonous voice. “Or….else….”
Yunze’s dim green dots for eyes looked over the Ecclesian Knight up and down. “Aren’t knights supposed to be tall and powerful?”
Eurus jabbed his sword in Yunze’s direction; not enough for it to be a legitimate strike, but just enough to serve as a warning to get back. A warning that Yunze did not pay any attention to in the slightest. “I said get back….”
The skelemental simply floated there for a few moments. They turned their gaze towards the inn, then back to Eurus. “Why aren’t you running?”
“What….?”
“Aren’t you going to go inside where it’s safe?”
Eurus shook his head, bringing his arm up to wipe off a thick layer of sweat from his forehead. “No….I have to protect everyone from you….”
“You can’t, though,” Yunze responded. “You’re very weak.”
“That….doesn’t matter.” He jabbed his sword forward again, but Yunze still did not flinch, “It’s my duty.”
The two stared one another down. Eurus’s arms started to shake from holding the sword aloft, but he willed himself to keep it steady. Yunze seemed to notice, focusing their eyes on the tip of the sword.
“Is this sword too heavy for you?”
Eurus chose not to answer this particular question, though that answer would have been clear to anyone watching. “This is….your last warning….skelemental scum….”
Yunze tilted their head to the side. “Last warning?”
“Before I….run you through….”
“But you can’t. You’re too weak.”
“No I’m-” Eurus suddenly paused, the gears in his mind slowly grinding along towards completing a thought they had begun constructing when the conversation had first begun. “Wait a minute….Skelementals can talk?”
Yunze nodded. “Yes.”
“….Whoa….”
The skelemental then said, “Sinzen requires a drink.”
“Huh?”
Yunze pointed their cloaked sleeve towards the inn. “Is there a drink in there?”
The sweat on Eurus’s forehead was threatening to flood into his eyeballs, but he couldn’t wipe them away with his sleeve; he no longer had the strength to hold his sword up with one arm, even for a mere second. “A….drink?”
“Yes.”
“Is that….all you want?”
“Yes.”
The Ecclesian Knight’s knees began to vibrate; he’d been standing too long; he needed to sit or lie down soon, or they might shatter outright. “If I….get you a drink….will you leave?”
“Yes.”
“….Fine….Stay here.”
Yunze nodded. “Okay.”
Eurus inched his way to the door of the inn, keeping his eyes on Yunze, watching for any sudden movements. He had to drop the sword into the ground in order to grab the doorknob, and his first attempt at opening failed, as his sweat-covered hand slipped right off of the thing. He managed to open it on the second try, fortunately, and ducked inside to find a drink.
He emerged a few moments later, poking his head around the edge of the door to see if Yunze was still floating there, which they were. He then stepped back outside, bottle of wine in one hand. With his other, he took hold of the sword, having recovered enough to maintain the blade with one arm again (even if only for a few seconds).
“Here’s a drink….It’s wine, I think….”
He held the bottle out, and Yunze took it. “Thank you. Was it heavy for you?”
“N-no….it’s just a bottle….”
“Yes, but you are very weak.”
Eurus jabbed forward with the sword, though it was a jittery maneuver, and veered off course a bit. “J-just….go away now….”
“Okay,” Yunze responded, though just before leaving, the skelemental then asked, “What’s your name?”
He didn’t see the point in giving information away to the enemy, but, at the same time, something about Yunze didn’t exactly scream “enemy” at that point, either. “Eurus….”
“Hi, Eurus. I am Yunze. Thank you for being my friend.”
“F-friend….?”
But the conversation was apparently over, as Yunze floated up into the sky, out of Eurus’s field of vision before disappearing into the darkness of the night.
* * * *
ULTRA KNIGHT
* * * *
Though Sevya was not aware of exactly how many totems lined the perimeter of Lunafei, it didn’t matter much to her with how easily she was able to break through them, and how fast her chariot soared around the forest city. Whether there were four, five, ten, or even twenty, she was confident she could send them crashing down within the span of a few minutes at most.
Her skeletal horses raced around a line of trees, their sights aimed for the next crystal totem. It was a tall structure, glittering brightly in the moonlight, composed of a stack of sculptures of various spirit animals.
Sevya snapped the reins, commanding the skelemental steeds to charge straight forward as quickly as they could. As their hooves clapped along the ground, sparks of electricity arced outward, and dust coalesced around them, turning the entire carriage into a racing thunder cloud.
“U-KNIGHT!”
A silver-white streak of light pierced through the dark storm cloud from the side, sending it veering off course. One of the skelemental horses’ front legs had been severed, causing it to crash in the dirt, bringing the chariot to a screeching halt.
Sevya instinctively reached for her shield and whipped it around just in time to deflect the swing of the U-Knight’s claymore. Though she was successful in blocking the attack, she couldn’t help but notice the raw power behind the swing; if he’d swung just a bit harder, he might have cut through the shield entirely.
She summoned a wall of lightning bolts, buying herself enough time to back away and put some distance between herself and the shining silver-white U-Knight who now stood atop her chariot, massive sword at the ready.
“I see your armor is still cracked,” Sevya stated. “All that time spent hiding away, and nothing to show for it.”
The U-Knight, as expected, said nothing.
A flash of lightning appeared in Sevya’s other hand, and a mighty skeletal hammer appeared in her grip. “Or perhaps you came here requesting I finish you off for good?”