“I’ll deal with your old master,” Hadrik tells Daren. “You go deal with the sage. Elementalists are supposed to be your specialty, aren’t they?”
“They are,” Daren says, as he starts casting a healing spell on himself. “I’ll take care of him.”
“Perfect!” Hadrik says. “Come on, Nolderan, let’s have ourselves a fun little sparring match!”
He then rushes towards Daren’s old master, and he tries to punch him again, but this time Nolderan was waiting for him, and he dodged his attack effortlessly. As the two of them begin their battle, Daren starts to shout very loudly at the sage, who is still in the sky, waiting for his next opponent.
“Hey, Talmak!” Daren shouts, while his wounds are still being magically healed. “Come down here so we can have a duel! One on one! What kind of a coward flies off to the sky like that, where his enemies can’t reach him?”
“Watch your tongue, healer in armor!” Talmak shouts. “Who do you think you’re talking to?”
“He does kind of have a point, though,” I say, in a loud voice, to make sure that Talmak can hear me. “If you really are the strongest earth elementalist of our time, like they say, shouldn’t you be able to win against us without these petty tricks? They don’t let you fly into the air while you’re fighting in the yearly sage contests, do they? So why are you doing that now? Is it because you’re afraid of Daren?”
“What did you just say?…” Talmak says.
“He’s asking if you’re afraid of me, Talmak,” Daren shouts. “Answer the man’s question, will you?”
“This insolence is going to cost you, healer,” Talmak says. “I don’t care what the legends say about you. I’m going to pound you into the ground and show you what happens when you mock a sage!”
He then quickly brings his floating platform to the ground, with a loud thud, as he steps off it, and begins to approach Daren, who is now completely healed.
After a short walk, Talmak stops at a distance of around one hundred feet from Daren, and he eyes him intensely. As the sage and Daren are getting ready to start their battle, everyone else temporarily stops what they were doing to watch the fight, except for the black-haired banshee, who is still flying after Flower, and shooting various spells at her.
“You can do it, Daren!” I say. “If you win this fight, they will be writing stories of you for many more years to come!”
“This is going to be his last story, boy,” Talmak says. “I’m going to make sure of it.”
The sage then creates two boulders that are twice the size of Daren, and he launches them both towards him, with his earth magic. Daren uses his sword to slice through the two boulders in a single motion, but instead of cutting them, the sword goes through them as through butter, and the rocks get smaller and smaller, in the span of a few seconds, until they become marble sized. The two marbles then begin to rotate around Daren’s sword, as if the blade were their center of gravity.
“What?…” Talmak asks, in a state of shock. “No, this can’t be…”
The sage immediately creates two more boulders that are even larger than before, and he throws them both at his opponent, while Daren begins to slowly walk towards him. Just like last time, Daren slashes through the two rocks in one motion, which causes them to shrink, and to join the other two marbles in gravitating around the sword.
“What’s the matter, Talmak?” Daren says, with a dark look in his eyes, as he continues to slowly walk towards him. “Weren’t you going to punish me for my insolence?”
“Sage Talmak!” Nolderan shouts, as the sage is beginning to panic a little. “Daren’s sword can absorb the elements. You can’t fight him with any rocks that are magically created. Use regular rocks! He won’t be able to absorb them fast enough!”
“Oh, so that’s how it is…” Talmak says.
He then begins to use his magic to pull several large boulders out of the earth, but before he manages to do it, Daren flings his sword at him with all his might, which sends all of the four marbles flying towards the sage.
The stone marbles quickly regain their original sizes, in mid-flight, while Talmak is forced to drop the rocks that he was pulling out of the earth, and to make a large, thick wall of stone in front of him, in order to defend himself from the incoming boulders. His wall isn’t enough to guard him completely, however, and one of the boulders manages to hit him directly, knocking him on his back.
“Don’t let him stab you with that sword!” Nolderan shouts. “He has a technique that can sever your link to the magical plane!”
As Daren makes a rush towards Talmak, the sage touches the ground with his hand while he’s still lying on his back, and then the earth immediately begins to shake with such power that it makes us all fall to the ground. While the earthquake is still going, Talmak raises himself to the air with yet another floating platform, while the earth below our feet is shaking so violently, that it’s beginning to crack.
“Damn it, he’s cheating again!” I say, as I look at the sage flying off in the sky.
“I think we may be having some bigger problems to deal with, at the moment,” Daren says, as he’s struggling to get back on his feet, due to the violent earthquake.
Soon, the cracks in the ground grow larger, and the earth itself starts to split in half, creating a large, bottomless chasm right in front of our eyes. And as if this weren’t enough, large chunks of rock are now being pulled from under our feet, leaving us with no ground to stand on, and sending us falling into the great abyss below.
The elf immediately makes a floating magical barrier below his feet, and another one for Nolderan, while Kate makes several floating ice platforms, right below us, in order to save us from the fall. Just before we reach the platforms, Kate, Leila, Daren, Hadrik and I all find ourselves suddenly floating in mid-air, as we are getting slowly raised from the chasm.
When we look up, we see Melindra, floating a few dozen feet above us, with that serious expression in her eyes again, while she’s making slow hand movements, to aid her in directing the air currents that are keeping us afloat.
“Melindra!” Flower says, as she is still being chased by the black-haired banshee in mid-air. “You shouldn’t be casting complicated spells so soon after being healed!”
“I’m fine,” Melindra says, while she pulls us out of the pit. “Don’t worry about me. You should be worrying about what the sage is doing up there, instead.”
As we all take a look to see what’s happening, we are shocked to find out that all of the rocks which were being pulled from the ground are now gathering up, to form a fifty foot tall golem, made out of stone, with the sage standing inside its head, on his floating platform from before.
“Why don’t you try absorbing this golem with your sword, Daren?” Talmak shouts from above. “Maybe you’ll manage to scratch the sole of its foot, before it stomps you to death!”
He then uses his earth powers to move the walls of rock on the sides of the chasm closer together, in order to create a path for his stone giant to walk on. The earth is trembling violently once more, as the pit below us gets narrower by the second, until the walls forming the crevice get joined together, leaving nothing but a small crack in the earth, between them.
In the meantime, Melindra makes us float until we are at a relatively safe distance from the golem, and then she lands us on the ground.
“Healer, you might want to make a barrier around everyone,” Melindra says. “And make it stronger than any barrier that you’ve ever cast before. I do not have a lot of control over the spells that I’m about to use from this moment onwards.”
“Oh…” Daren says. “Alright. I’m on it.”
He then uses his shield to make a semi-transparent magical barrier around all of us, while Melindra begins to fly higher into the air.
“Flower, you need to take your fight elsewhere,” Melindra says. “Get as far away from here as possible. I’m not planning to hold back.”
“Okay!” Flower says
. “Follow me, banshee! This way!”
She then propels herself in the direction opposite to the golem, with her fire jets, as the black-haired banshee rushes to follow her. When Flower is safely out of the way, Melindra casts a spell, and suddenly we can see hundreds of sharp looking blades made of wind rotate around her, at great speed. The wind blades are likely sharpened in the same way that Illuna or Kate sharpen their own elements, and they are mostly transparent, except for when the light of the sun shines on them.
While Melindra is raising herself higher up, the giant made of stone begins to move forward, at a slow pace, and the sage’s henchmen are now hurrying to get out of the golem’s way, so that they won’t get stepped on.
All of a sudden, Melindra loses control of one of her wind blades, which flies at an incredible speed right into the ground in front of us, cutting through it as if it were made from paper.
“Damn…” Daren says, as he looks at the hole in the ground left by the blade from earlier. “I really hope that my barrier is strong enough to protect us from one of these, if it hits us.”
“Maybe you could try to use your sword to absorb the wind blades,” I say.
“I did think of that,” Daren says, “but I’m not sure if I’d be fast enough to catch one of them, and if I miss it, I could risk getting my arm cut off…”
“What if you hold your sword through the magical barrier, and keep your arm inside?” I say. “You can do that, right?”
“Yeah,” Daren says. “I guess I could give it a shot.”
“I heard what you were saying about me earlier, you know…” Melindra shouts at the sage, from high up in the sky, with a rather calm tone in her voice. “I heard you talking about how you needed to keep me alive while dissecting me. You sure do have some nerve to speak about a stillwater like this, don’t you?”
“You’re a little too late, stillwater girl,” Talmak shouts back at her. “Maybe you could have stopped me before I made this golem, but now, even one of your tornados won’t be able to destroy what I’ve created. I don’t know what you’re trying to do with those small rotating blades of yours, but I assure you that they will not help you in any way.”
“Is that so?…” Melindra says.
“I’ve heard enough of your talking,” Talmak says. “If I can’t use you as an experiment, then you have no value to me. Prepare to die!”
After the sage stops talking, his golem quickly extends its right arm towards Melindra, and it tries to crush her in its hand. However, as soon as the hand tries to close in around Melindra, the hundreds of wind blades that were rotating around her react all at once, and they cut the rocks into tiny pieces in a matter of seconds.
“No…” Talmak says, in complete shock, as he looks at the golem arm before him, which is now missing its hand entirely.
“I believe it is time to show you, Sage Talmak, why air is the strongest of all the magical elements…” Melindra says, and then she unleashes ten times more blades than she had before, throwing them all in the stone giant’s direction.
The thousands of wind blades all soar through the air, at breathtaking speed, and for a few seconds, we could see a great spectacle of shimmering lights, as the sun was getting reflected into each of the blades, in turn. The great stone giant from before was now being sliced into pieces before our very eyes, and while the sage was still trying to bring several boulders from the ground, to replace some of the lost parts, these rocks were getting cut as well, by the multitude of semi-transparent air blades that Melindra was still sending towards Talmak.
A few stray blades also hit Daren’s barrier, during this time, but it seems to be holding well, for now. There’s also the fact that Daren managed to catch one or two of the wind blades with his sword, so there wasn’t as much strain on the barrier as there could have been.
When he realizes that there’s no way his regular rocks can withstand Melindra’s bombardment, Talmak quickly creates a wall in front of him, and then he uses his magic to fortify it as much as he can.
“Delvram!” the sage shouts at his elf companion. “Get us out of here, now! We won’t last for another minute at this rate!”
“As you wish, Sage Talmak…” the elf says, and then he starts casting a teleportation spell, on himself, and all of his allies.
When she hears the elf, Melindra sends a few blades his way as well, but the mage raises a barrier in front of him, which deflects all of her attacks.
“No!” the banshee shouts, as her body is beginning to vibrate, and to shine with a bright light, while the same thing is happening to all of her companions. “Don’t take me with you! Leave me here, damn it! I’m not done with—”
Before she gets to finish what she had to say, the banshee gets teleported out of the area, and the same happens to Talmak, Nolderan, and the elf. As soon as our enemies disappear, Melindra dismisses all of her wind blades, and she begins to descend towards us, while Flower is also flying our way.
“Wow…” Daren says, when Melindra gets close to us. “That was… really impressive.”
“Nice try, healer,” Melindra says, as she lands on the ground, next to us. “But I think we both know that this isn’t what you are really thinking, at this moment. Now that the cat’s out of the bag, and you know about the problems I have with controlling my powers, you must already be thinking up some strategies of how you can avoid to be put in such a dangerous situation again, aren’t you?”
“Sure, I guess…” Daren says, confused. “But I don’t see why—”
“Then let me ask you directly…” Melindra says. “Are you, or are you not planning to cast a spell on me that limits my powers?”
“What?…” Daren says. “No! Of course not! What are you even saying? Do you know how risky it would be to try and cast a spell like that on you, given the nature of your stillwater aura? You could even die from something like that. I would never even dream of casting such a spell on you!”
“You wouldn’t?…” Melindra says, looking slightly taken aback.
“Listen,” Daren says. “I think I’m starting to understand why you never told us about your problem. And I don’t blame you. We didn’t exactly start off on the best of terms, and you had no reason to trust us, just as we didn’t trust you. But for what it’s worth, I think you made the right call. You should not risk joining any of our battles, unless we have absolutely no other way of dealing with our enemies. Any other type of strategy would be too risky.”
“I agree,” Kate says. “Even if she doesn’t put us in any immediate danger, a slight scratch from one of her wind blades could be all it takes for the oath to be set off, and to kill her where she stands. As long as there isn’t some other sage waiting around the corner, we should be able to handle any situation by ourselves, just as we’ve done in the past.”
She then turns to Melindra, with a hesitant look in her eyes.
“And I’d like to say that I’m… sorry for misinterpreting some of your intentions in the past few days,” Kate says. “I understand now that you were only trying to look out for yourself, and that you meant us no harm.”
“Barry, what did you do to them?” Melindra asks me, while looking somewhat terrified. “They’re not acting like themselves! Does your stat device have some mind-affecting spell that I don’t know of?”
“They’re just trying to be nice, Melindra,” I say. “There’s no need to act so shocked about it. Also, could we maybe move away from this camp? I have a feeling that we’re going to start getting attacked by a hundred pinecone-collecting underlings if we stay in this place much longer…”
“Good thinking!” Daren says. “But what about the sage, and master Nolderan? Maybe they’re still lurking around here, somewhere.”
“Nah, they’re both gone,” Arraka says. “And so are their other allies that you were fighting earlier. If I’m not able to sense them, then they must have teleported to their real base. You know… the one that is not just an empty area with a stone table in the middle…�
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“You’re probably right,” Daren says. “Come on, let’s get going, and we’ll talk more on the way.”
As we walk away from the camp area, we notice that the mages who were collecting pinecones earlier are all gone. They must have run away when they saw the giant made out of stone. And who could blame them? It’s not like you see something like that every day.
“So, just to make sure that we’re all on the same page, here…” Melindra says, while we’re walking through the empty forest. “You guys don’t want to cast any sort of spells on me to fix my problem with controlling my powers…”
“That’s right,” Daren says.
“And you want me to continue to avoid all of your battles, just like before?…” Melindra asks.
“Exactly,” Daren says.
“Okay, I’m going to be honest,” Melindra says. “This still sounds a little fishy to me. But I guess I’m going to have to trust your word, for now… I mean, I did witness with my own eyes how icey took my side, against the sage, after all…”
“Oh, you saw that…” Kate says, looking a little flustered.
“Well, technically I couldn’t really turn my head, back then, so I mostly only just heard it happen, but yes…” Melindra says. “I almost thought that I was hallucinating there, for a second. Of all the people that I would have expected to attack the sage first, in that situation, Kate would have been the last on my mind.”
“You… just called me by my real name…” Kate says, looking very surprised.
“I suppose I did, icey,” Melindra says, with a slight smile. “I suppose I did…”
“So, which way are we headed?” Daren says.
“We’ll go straight ahead for another few hours, until we reach a small lake,” Melindra says. “We’ll take a break there, and then I’ll show you the rest of the way.”
Not long after we are done talking, I suddenly hear Rose’s voice through the transceiver. As soon as I hear her, I immediately remember the last time when the revenant contacted me, and how she asked me to keep the transceiver open, so she could call me again.
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