Upon an Ancient Battlefield

Shards of rock and ice flew in all directions as the battle neared its climax. Soldiers and knights of almost two dozen kingdoms, joined together in crisis, crossed blades with reanimated skeletons and bound devils. Flames poured from the maw of the great dragon Peyvar, bound by the Witch King Euric, as the great beast made one last flight across the battlefield. Finally the wyrm fell from the sky, succumbing to its injuries at last.

Behind the lines of the army of darkness two figures fought. Surrounded by the corpses of their friends and minions, the Witch King and the Hero Gelvira dueled. The dark lord threw spell after spell from his rings filled enslaved spirits and demons, constantly teleporting short distancees to stay out of the heros reach, the battlefield itself bound to his will. The Hero for her part kept chasing, even as flames and bolts of lightning cracked her lips and burned her lungs. The Bound Hero had been warded with enough protection magic to survive a divine strike, but the wards had weakened under the dark lords constant assault.

With a prayer in her heart and a battlecry on her lips, the Hero leaped forward. Much faster then she had been even at the start of the battle, she finally caught the him. The Gelvira's runeforged sword shone in a raindow of magical light. Empowered by priests, enchanters, and her destiny which had been bound before the battle, the sword ripped through the The Witch Kings demonplate from shoulder to stomach. The fight was over, and with it Eurics conquests, this was a blow not even a warlock of his immense power could recover from.

To the surprise of the Chosen Hero, the Euric did not blink away once more. Rather he embraced her, in a way which somehow reminded her of a grieving child.

And with one last pronouncement dark energy gathered at the Witch Kings hands. Pain, as if every drop of blood was crying out in agony, coursed through the Hero's back. Necrofied flesh rapidly spread from where the his hands had touched.

Cursing, the Gelvira pushed the dark lord from her sword. With a swift blow to his neck, the Witch King Euric breathed his last.

North Gania, the de Meer Urban Home, Nine Hundred and Ninety Nine Years Three Hundred and Sixty Days Later

"... and so the Hero returned, bringing news of the Witch Kings defeat. She soon died of her wounds, but not before founding the Knights of the Rainbow Blade to fight demons, devils, and all the other scary monsters of the world."

With that Mariane de Meer closed book she had been reading aloud, and reached for the glass of milk next to her bed,

"Daddies a knight too, right?" asked her little sister, Elizabeth.

"Yes, but.." Mariane took a small sip of her cup "but he's a member of the Order of the Silver WIng, which is more of a social club. The Knights of the Rainbow Blade are down in Goueridian"

"Do they have a lot of demons down in gower- gord- Gouerdian?

"I don't know, probably no more then anywhere else. Now run along I have a big day tomorrow and I need my sleep."

Elizabeth got out of her sisters bed and started towards the door, then she hesitated. "Could you ask mom and dad to let me come? I really want to see the academy! I know they would say yes if you asked."

Mariane sighed, she couldn't exactly tell her sister that she had been the one to ask their parent not to bring her, Marianne would never forgive her! "Liza.. I don't think it would help. Plus you're gonna go hang out with uncle Julius for the week! I here he is going to have a party this weekend!"

"I don't wanna hang out with stupid uncle Julius, and I don't want to go to his stupid party either!" Elizabeth seemed to be getting increasingly agitated and increasingly petulant.

"Liza. I'm sorry, but there nothing I can do. Now please go to bed, we both need our sleep." For a moment Elizabeth seemed ready to argue more, but she seemed to think better of it. Instead she sulked out of the room, closing the door with all the force a six year old could muster.

Once Elizabeth was out of the room, Mariane grabbed her handcrystal and sent a quick message to Susan, the maid. Their parents were out tonight, and someone needed to get Liza to sleep.

Mariane needed to get some much needed sleep, but she had her handcrystal in hand already. So she sent sent a quick message to her best friend Fanny. It was two hours later that she finally closed her eyes for the night.

Julius de Meer's residence, Five Days Later

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Elizabeth was bored. Elizabeth was bored because everything around her was boring. Julius de Meer was boring. Julius de Meer's house was boring. Julius de Meer's friends were boring. Somehow Julius de Meer's parties were also boring, judging by the one happening this night. Even the parties Elizabeth's parents threw, stuffy affairs that they were, had people dressing in their fanciest clothes. If Julius's gusts had brought their fanciest clothes, they were in the strange bags that every guest had brought.

So what was a bored young girl supposed to do, but what she had been told not to? Uncle Julius had told her that his study was off limits tonight, which instantly made it more interesting then everything else about Uncle Julius. So, while everyone else was down stairs haveing the most boring conversations imaginable, Elizabeth was upstairs breaking into her Uncle's study.

Honestly "breaking in" was too generous. Uncle Julius hadn't even locked the door. Perhaps he hadn't forseen Elizabeth being so rebellious as to disobey direct orders from her uncle. Perhaps it was fate.

Inside Julius' study changes had been made. Much larger then a normal study, the center of the room was normally dominated by a large table faceing towards the window. Last time she had been in the study Elizabeth had found scattered notes all around the room, covered in her uncles scrawling handwriting. Now the room was completely empty, save for the vast runic array in the center of the room.

Elizabeth had heard of rune magic, a way to perform magic without keeping the entire binding in ones own mind while working. However she had never seen it before. Maybe if she had she would have known the dangers of messing with it.

Elizabeth crept forward towards the runic array. Every instinct in her body told her to turn and walk away from the room. Unfortunatley Elizabeth  wasn't very good at following directions.

It is at this point that Elizabeth changed the course of history. Or perhaps she fufilled the role destiny had made for her. Elizabeth touched a rune. The rune was smudged.

There was a part of Elizabeth who wanted to go downstairs, apologize to her Uncle, and confess that she went into his study and touched his runic array. That part didn't make her decisions. Instead Elizabeth slowly backed out of the rune and crept down the stairs. She told no one about her indiscretion.

Not long after, Julius called Elizabeth over.

Elizabeth's heart lept to her throat. Surely this meant that uncle Julius had discovered what she had done! How disapointed would her parent be! But no, instead he only offered her a glass of honeyed milk. It seemed as if the whole party was watching her as she accepted the glass. Uncle Julius almost looked sad.

Elizabeth was asleep before she had took a second sip.

In the Sixth of the Nine Hells, Choronzon, A Very Important Night

After a thousand years you kind of get used to being trapped in a flameing sarcophagus. You never stop feeling the pain, but you start to be able to work through it. You start to be able to recollect yourself, see how far you have fallen, and dream of an escape you know will never come. That is part of the torture.

Now if you did know that you could escape, and you were impatiently waiting for your minions to finally free you, that might feel like its own torture.

Euric, better known as "Evil Euric" or "The Witch King of Toulouse", had been planning his escape from hell for the better part of two centuries. And tonight was the night he would be free. Euric knew this because he had bound the event into destiny. His freedom was inevitable as gravity.

As midnight in the mortal realms approached, Euric felt his very being begin to stretch. Being summoned to another realm felt like being forcefully sucked down a long thin tube.

No wonder the devils I summon are always in such a bad mood. Euric mused.

Julius de Meer's Study, Midnight exacty One Thousand Years After the Death of the Witch King

The air was full of incense, apon the walls someone had hung iron weapons, every member of the Witch Kings Heirs were chanting Euric's praises in Old Gothic. These gestures were only mildly surprising to Euric. A cult taking him as their god and decing to summon him to the mortal world was one of the more likely escapes Euric had imagined the universe would engineer, and one of the more helpful. The true faith of a large enough amount of people could be bound into the creation of a godhead. A divine clone might not be the most trustworthy allly, but of course thats what magic is for.

Euric took the oppertunity to observe the ritual which his followers had created.

The first thing to note was the body of the young girl he had been summoned into.

The ritual to summon Euric was not blood magic. Many powerful extraplanar summoning magic rituals used a recent death to serve as an exchange or as bridge between worlds. The Nine Hells knew how to thwart such obvious interference, and took steps to prevent its high priority prisoners from using such methods to escape.

The ritual focus had not been killed in exchange for his own life. Instead she served as the gate which he had just been pulled through, and a vessel which he could now remake into his own image. Or rather, should have been able to remake in his own image.

Like all sufficiently skilled magic users, Euric had an innate sense of bindings in his vicinity. He could feel the runes surrounding the sleeping child, even if he could only see her eyelids. Euric could sense the smudged rune in the ritual, which had resulted in a gapeing hole in the magic supposed to bind him to the child. Specificly the parts of the ritual which were supposed to give him power over his new body.

Euric didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the cruel joke the universe had played on him. It didn't matter, he didn't have enough control over the body he was in to do either.

Julius de Meer's Residence, The Day After a Very Important Day

Elizabeth awoke in her uncle's guest bedroom the next morning, not remembering a thing about the night before.

That did not disturb her in any way, Elizabeth was not quite at an age where she cared about what she did or did not remember. 

Suddenly a voice spoke to her, as if from the very depths of her soul.

"Hello Elizabeth de Meer, my name is Euric, and it is nice to make your acquaintance."

Elizabeth was very excited. She had heard that some children had imaginary friends, but she had never seen the need. However, now that she finally had an imaginary friend of her own, she was convinced it would be the most fun she had in ages.

"Ok Eurie, we're gonna be best friends."

"That is not my name, and-"

"Would you like to have tea and biscuits? I don't have my set but we can pretend!"

"That would be acceptable, we have much to discuss."