by Max Jager
As the first guard lifelessly fell to the ground the other two began to panic, they both rushed in and slashed for Damion's ribs from both sides. And just like before Damion did not stop them, he let the guards cut into him, it only made him laugh even more as their swords were stopped again after cutting just a inch into him. It hurt, it was extremely painful, but Damion loved the pain, it made him feel alive, it made it so much more thrilling to kill the person who had hurt him. His wounds were forming a puddle of blood at his feet, and all of a sudden the blood at his feet hardened, becoming as strong as steel, then two large spikes made out of the steel blood shot up from the puddle and impaled the two guards.
The guards had seen magic before, everyone could use it, but they had never seen anything like this. They had never seen a man with steel blood, it was so unexpected the guards were caught off guard and were killed on the spot.
Sarah was horrified, she wanted to swoop down and help but what could she do against the steel blooded man with just her spear? She never took the time to learn any magic, aside from her telekinesis which she didn't know well enough to attack with. As she surveyed the battlefield she saw another man, who she knew as Zadar. He was telepathically controlling a hundred swords, the swords were all flying around him, attacking everyone near him. Another unknown woman was sprinting through the streets at blinding, inhuman speeds gunning everyone down with magically reloading crossbows. Sure, the guards defending the place had equally diverse magic and skills, but they were completely outmatched. In some cases, by the masterful combat skill of their opponents, or in other cases by the sheer overwhelming power of their opponents, like Damion. Usually not both though.
There was a few guards Sarah spotted that were winning the battle against their foes. Sarah felt ever so slightly relieved, maybe there was some hope for the guards to win. A few of these guards seemed to be much stronger than the attackers. Sara was able to spot her former allies, Drake, Charles, Amanda, Em, and Fate fighting off the attackers and holding their ground. As Sarah watched Fate, she noticed that the woman was a lot stronger then when she had last seen her. Fate was fighting with some sort of magic cards. Although, it made Sarah wonder where Brooke, Elliott, and the others from her group were. She saw Fate charge Damion head on, only to throw a card at him and jump away at the last second. The card stuck to the confused Damion's forehead, and then suddenly the card was struck by lightning, and Damion was knocked out cold in an instant. The man was powerful but not very smart.
But as Fate rushed forwards to finish Damion off a portal suddenly opened right behind her, and a massive scythe swung out of the portal. In a panicked effort to save herself Fate used one card to summon a set of thick plate armor over her body, but the scythe hit her so hard that it cut through the plate armor and cut deeply into her side, sending her flying into a nearby wall. Her armor saved her from being cleaved in half, but she was incapacitated and wounded too badly to move.
Sarah watched, and realized why this battle was so incredibly one sided. Every guard or player who tried defending the village, and started winning, met the same demise. The ones who stood a chance and started to beat these attackers were brought down by the massive scythe and none of them knew what it was or where it was coming from. "Kaden..." Sarah muttered and looked around. Eventually, she spotted one tall man wearing black armor, with a cape just like all of the attackers. He was not in the battle, he stood up on a cliff on the nearby mountain overlooking the village. He held a massive scythe in his hand that was bigger than his own body, it looked very awkward and clunky, but every once in a while he would open a portal in front of himself and would swing his scythe through it.
He wasn't too far away, and it seemed like he was paying too much attention to the battle to notice Sarah nearby. Either that or he simply didn't care that she was there. Suddenly he opened his virtual screen and Sarah could see that he was talking with someone. He was distracted.
Sarah knew that this was her opportunity, she knew her and Charley had to take matters into their own hands and stop Kaden themselves if they wanted to save the village. "Charley, we need to take that man out. He is just tearing apart the town's strongest fighters, and they don't know where he is so they are helpless to stop him. It is up to us." She said. "Watch out for that scythe-portal trick, he can attack us from long range with the scythe by using portals."
Charley nodded and they turned to swoop down at Kaden. Kaden looked up at them for a moment and let out a sigh of annoyance. "Shoo!" He called out to them, he opened a portal in front of himself and slashed his scythe through it again. Charley and Sarah knew what was coming, Charley swerved and flew to the side, narrowly dodging the scythe. Kaden sighed in annoyance and watched as Charley swooped down straight towards him, and he saw Sarah thrust her spear forwards, trying to stab through Kaden's armor with the momentum from Charley's flight.
Kaden made a portal appear in front of the tip of Sarah's spear, and another portal appeared right in front of Sarah. Her spear went through one portal, and out the other, she couldn't stop it because Charley couldn't see the portals behind his head and didn't stop flying forwards. Her spear stabbed into her own chest and she was knocked off Charley's back, falling right off the cliff. A split second after, as Charley came in close, Kaden sidestepped Charley's attack and threw a chakram made of magic energy at him. The chakram sliced through the Wyvern's wing and sent it crashing down into the cliffs.
Sarah fell down the side of the cliff, bouncing and skidding across the rocks the entire way down until she finally came to a stop in the city at the bottom of the mountain. Her spear was lost somewhere along the way. Her entire body was searing in extreme pain, it hurt so badly that she tried to scream and couldn't make a sound. She had countless broken bones and the stab wound from her own spear, she couldn't move. She looked up to see someone walking towards her, and she recognized him immediately. The big, burly blue-haired man, it was George. Like Fate and Damion, he had been with the group Sarah escorted to the city weeks ago. He now wore a huge set of heavy armor and carried an oversized hammer and a big shield, it was shocking how he was able to even carry all of that, he had become a lot stronger then he was when she first met him. She was relieved to see her old ally, until she spotted the white cape on his back.
Sarah knew what was coming, she couldn't fight back, she knew she was as good as dead now. She watched as George closed in on her and then suddenly she was swooped up by something else. She looked up to see the familiar green scales of Charley, he had picked her up with his front legs, being careful not to stab her with his claws, and was trying to fly away. But he was badly wounded and was struggling to fly. "I got you, don't worry!" Charley said in a pained voice.
At least they were safe now, the armored man could not fly so surely he couldn't catch them. But Sarah looked down to see what he was doing and saw the massive hammer the man had been carrying hurtling up towards them. "Look out!" she tried to warn but Charley couldn't evade fast enough and it slammed into his side. Charley roared out in pain, dropping Sarah to the ground again before he too fell out of the sky and crashed down into the street.
Sarah hit the ground hard again and shouted out in pain, but she was trying to fight through it, she bit her lip and tried crawling out of sight. She crawled into one of the nearby houses that had not been finished, but she wasn't fast enough, George spotted her. He did not follow her in though, she wasn't sure why. Suddenly she heard a loud crash from outside, and what sounded like wood splintering, then another, and another. The shell of the house she was hiding in was starting to creak, and she noticed more and more light starting to shine into the house. And then it hit her, he had knocked down the support beams, and he was bashing in the front wall. She started trying to crawl out of the house as fast as she could. But she wasn't fast enough, before she could make it to the door there was another loud smash, and the creaking of the house got louder and louder until suddenly the few remaining support beams snapped and the entire house collap
sed in on itself.
A bright flash of light appeared on the mountainside not far from where Kaden was standing, just a couple minutes after Sarah and Charley were knocked out of the sky. When the light cleared Estellese was standing at the center of where it had been. She was already exhausted from trying to heal the sick all day, but she pushed that aside and charged up the mountain towards where Kaden had been. "KADIN!" She screamed out, her voice echoing through the mountains.
As Estellese sprinted up the mountainside, suddenly thirteen soldiers from Kaden's army sprang out of hiding, surrounding Estellese. They began quickly moving in, intent on taking her down before she could reach Kaden. As the first charged at Estellese with his sword, Estellese's right arm suddenly became covered in stone. She grabbed his sword with the stone gauntlet, then punched him in the face with her other hand. The man was knocked to the ground, but a second attacker came at Estellese from behind with a dagger.
Estellese clapped her hands together and she disappeared in a blinding flash of light. Appearing right behind her attacker just a split second after. She grabbed the man by the back of the neck and lifted him off the ground, then in one swift move she made a stone spike spring out of the ground and slammed him down onto it.
As the next two attackers rushed in from two different sides Estellese stomped the ground, causing a small earthquake that knocked them both off their feet. Estellese pointed one hand at each of them and fired a bolt of lightning from her fingertips, striking them both. But by now almost all of the other fighters were closing in on her all at once, the rest of the group had caught up. She used her signet to change her main elements to Fire and Air, then she took a deep breath. As the enemies grew closer she created a massive gust of wind all around herself, pulling them all towards her. While they were all blown off their feet and hurtling towards her she slammed her hands together and made an explosion of flames around her, then followed it up with another massive gust of wind blowing through the flames towards the enemies. The second gust of wind amplified the fire, making the explosion even bigger and it threw everyone caught in the explosion away from her. Many of them were thrown off the cliff, while some were just thrown around and badly burnt.
Estellese looked around and saw that all of them were either dead, dying, or unconscious. With the trap sprung and dealt with she resumed sprinting up the mountain towards Kaden. Within just a few more seconds of running she could see him in the distance, he was standing on the edge of the cliff, looking out into the village. In a blinding flash of light Estellese disappeared again and reappeared right behind Kaden. However before she could strike him Kaden spun around and threw a punch for her head.
Estellese blocked the punch then threw a jab for Kaden's chest, but Kaden took a step back, moving out of her reach and returning a kick to her side. Estellese quickly grabbed his leg but before she could do anything Kaden brought his scythe down, slashing for her arms. It forced her to let go and jump backwards to avoid getting struck.
"Heyy! Long time no see." Kaden greeted.
"No! Drop the damn act Kaden! What the HELL is wrong with you!?" Estellese shouted at him.
Kaden laughed a little. "Well, you guys promised them over and over that you'd be able to protect them from anything and everything. I wanted to test that. I guess you lied to all of them, they don't look very safe or protected."
"You attacked right as some disease spread through everyone!" Estellese shouted back. "The guards are all weak!"
Kaden shrugged. "Yeah I know. I had really wanted to put mind control chips in all of the cookies so I could turn all the village guards against the village. But through all my research and studying I could neither find a scientific nor magical way to do it. So eventually I gave up and just put three different types of poison in the cookies. To poison them and ensure the antidote wouldn't be found too quickly. Not as fun this way though."
"Why! What the hell are you getting out of this!?" Estellese roared back at him, her arms were starting to shake from the rage surging through her.
"Well, someone had to show all the people that you guys were lying to them." Kaden shrugged. "Someone had to show them that the village wasn't really safe, so they'd all actually go out into the world and get to work on training. If I didn't do it someone else would have, better I do it now, before they all get comfortable in the facade of safety. I am saving lives, rather ironically by killing a few people, but in the end everyone will now have to learn how to protect themselves."
"You're destroying an entire village just to prove a point!?" Estellese shouted back at him.
"No. I'm attacking five villages to prove a point. Bele village, Oline City, Era City, Port Redwarren, and Barre Village. All of the human settlements that are currently being built, they all fall today." Kaden replied. "Now, go back to the village, let them all know that you and Mendelen failed. Let them know that they are now under the rule of me and my army. We are the Moderators, we will be watching the world from the shadows. Anyone caught in violation of our rules will be assassinated. Our rules? We are the only ones allowed to murder other humans; we will enforce a general rule of morality and will target those we see as immoral; those we deem corrupt will be assassinated; anyone we deem to be too powerful, or people who we deem have an unhealthy obsession with power will be assassinated; and we will not baby anyone, everyone must-" He started explaining but was interrupted.
"I could tell you were a sociopath within the first couple weeks of our adventure. I should have killed you as soon as I realized what you were, but I stupidly thought you were a friend." Estellese growled in a chilling tone. Interrupting his speech.
"But I am your friend. You would be wise to remember that." Kaden replied and crossed his arms.
"No. You're just a sociopath. I won't make the same mistake twice." Estellese clenched her fists to try and stop her arms from shaking, trying to calm herself down. She knew she didn't fight well when she was too angry and Kaden was really pushing her.
"Comeon, you know that turning against me is the real mistake. You've all grown weak and complacent. You can't beat me now." Kaden stated. "I told you this would happen. You didn't listen and now you failed all those people, their deaths are on your hands."
"MY hands!? No. You really think I can't kill you? You wanna bet on that!?" Estellese roared back at him as her temper flared again. Kaden's comments had set her off and there was no calming down this time. With a quick wave of her hand a bright red circle appeared under Kaden's feet, and in an instant a pillar of flames burst out of the ground and engulfed Kaden. However when the flames disappeared Kaden was gone and only a portal remained. The portal disappeared immediately after she saw it.
Suddenly a portal opened beside Estellese and Kaden's scythe swung through it. Estellese quickly ducked underneath the blade, then reached up and grabbed the handle of the scythe. She yanked the handle, using her enhanced strength to pull Kaden out of the portal beside herself. As soon as he came stumbling through she spun around and slammed a spinning roundhouse kick into his ribs. She struck him hard enough to dent his metal armor and she knocked him to the ground. As he fell she yanked his scythe out of his hands and threw it off the cliff. However, before Kaden hit the ground a portal opened beneath him and he fell through it.
Suddenly, the area all around Estellese turned pitch black. It was like all the light had been sucked out of the area. She looked around quickly and couldn't figure out where Kaden had gone in the darkness. Estellese switched her elements to light and darkness, then created a light in her hand while simultaneously trying to grab hold of the darkness surrounding her and pry it away. Kaden just had a darkness spell, he didn't control it like she did, so she easily tore the veil of shadows off and restored the light to the area. However the first thing she saw once the darkness was gone was Kaden walking out of a portal with his scythe.
Estellese quickly pointed at Kaden and fired a beam of light at him, concentrating a massive amount of light to a tiny point, making it int
o a laser. Kaden had not seen that one coming, and the light traveled too fast for him to evade. The light laser burnt a thin hole clean through his armor and his shoulder, causing Kaden to shout out in pain. Kaden quickly opened a new portal and ran through.
Estellese looked around and spotted him stepping out of a portal a short distance behind her. Kaden tapped the handle of his giant scythe on the ground, and almost immediately hundreds of skeletal hands began reaching out of the ground around Estellese's feet. Their arms rapidly grew longer until they could reach her, and then they began grabbing onto her arms and legs, pinning her down.
Estellese started trying to struggle against the bone hands but couldn't break free. She looked up to see Kaden create a large energy chakram from the element Aether: Black Magic, then he suddenly threw it at her legs. Estellese tried to break free of the skeletal hands, trying to evade the magic chakram, but there was too many of them, she couldn't break out of their grasp. In a hurried panic, she switched her elements back to her default fire and earth, then lifted the ground under her feet up, lifting the skeletal hands up with her.