399 CHPT 399: Tides.
"AHHHH!!"
The blood curdling yell radiated across the tops of the canyon, followed by the clashing of heavy blades and the swipes of bladed talons. The hits-- inhumanely hard, resonating like the crash of colossal symbols left to rattle the grounds hard enough to raise sand and snow from grassed over rock.
Another yell resonated, followed by a twisting flurry of chained blades slicing through the night. In the darkness, a green glowing shape bobbed and weaved through the madness.
"Your rage is misguided, no? It has misguided you..... look who you call your allies."
"And who are yours? Two shifters.... you don't even know who you've been connected to by taking them in....." Liam spat venomously.
Rollan's ears perked up at the Elven Murderers response. He watched him then for a moment as they ceased in combat for a moment in time. Even with his physically blind eyes he could see him. Nature could see him.
He paced, a few hundred feet out in the darkness. Small cuts lined his bare arms as small portions of the feathers on his coat fell into the night. They shimmered with the wetness of his blood as the sun rose in the distance. Morning was coming to the outside-- and inside. Inside Liam something rumbled, shown in the blue fissure breaking open wider and wider in his chest.
He coughed suddenly, stifling a laugh as the hand that covered his face fell. There was a time when he was undeniably beautiful-- a perfect example of what they were meant to be. Now, with his sunken eyes, blackened lips and starved features, he just looked empty.
"You have no idea... me and you are almost as close as we were all those years ago. Because of those Shifters. You have no idea.... no idea how it all connects."
BOOOM!
He stomped the floor. The sand rose from the earth and sent a torrent of blue flame.
Rollan wood-weaved, twisting his arms in a circle in front of himself that caused the wooden spikes protruding from the earth all over to converge into a spinning wheel that functioned as a shield.
The flames smashed into the wooden shield and flew overhead, sparking against his Oak-Wood Armor and turning the sand in the air to glass shards that sunk into the wood with an incessant thud.
"YOU HAVE NO IDE--"
Liam was cut off by the sudden bone-chilling rumble of something massive roaring to the skies. The flames stopped, whatever it was had grabbed Liam's attention. The Harpy was another case entirely.
"Come here Druid!" She screeched as she flew around his shield and attacked him from the left.
Rollan ducked the talons heading straight for his face. As she flew forward, he stood up and pulled a collection of roots from the earth in front of her.
SHCK!
"Augh!" The Harpy inhaled sharply as the wood impaled her midflight and continued to twist and stab into her.
As she faded, he found his blind eyes drawn to the shape in the distance. It was massive, rumbling the earth as it ran behind a beastial figure on two legs.
[+800 EXP]
"Beast of Beasts..." Rollan thought in partial disbelief.
Immediately after speaking, he flipped out of the way of his shield being shattered to charred splinters by Liam's blades.
Another attack came, he dodged, followed by another that he blocked with his dull great sword before activating his, (Slash) ability.
FWOO!
He blinked across the field at blinding speeds, feeling his blade smash into Liam's midsection and crack a few ribs before knocking him off his feet and sending him rumbling across the grassed sands.
Before he could even stop rolling, Rollan began wood-weaving, tying and twisting up Liam in the roots he ripped from the earth to hold him to the floor.
[20% MP Remaining (1810/9050)]
"This needs to come to an end. Now." Rollan thought in response to the System notification.
A burst of flame exploded from his left hand, leaving a sword in it's wake. Inexplicably simple yet profound in it's design. No room for glitz or glamour in extra attachments or additions. Simple. Killing efficient in it's perfect balance and clean silver blade. Under the Moons glow it had a reflective green tint. And when he flipped the blade, testing it's familiar weight and balance, the style changed.
Sometimes a Katana...
Other times an Elven Serras....
Or a long double-sided blade.
It ended as a simple broadsword. It's HellSlaying potential no worse for wear.
Liam shook in the binds, breathing fire and raging from beneath the long-grassed grounds like a small dragon.
Rollan didn't feel an ounce of regret as he took off. As his wooden knights armor hardened, doubling in layers and sprouting naturally poisonous barbs from the seeds that bloomed beneath the surface. With each step he became more efficient in dispelling the unnatural. No matter that it was tied to his childhood. He had a purpose, and more responsibilities than he'd had in a while.
"I wonder if you're understanding our purpose as you fight down there, Monsieur..." He thought before leaping into the air with his blades raised and ready to sink into the Elven Murderer. The long-lost brother joined by strife and purpose.
Liam continued to shake. Rollan continued to fall. It all felt like it froze when he suddenly screamed and the fissure in his chest expanded with a burst of cold blue light that incinerated his wooden binds and gave way to a massive sleek black shape.
It slithered out of him like lightning, it's body so heavy and corded with muscle that when it hit Rollan he was sent flying. Off the cliff and crashing into the ground below.
As he rocketed towards the ground below, the sounds of war rose. Animalistic wars, Demonic screams, feminine psychotic laughter. All of this filled his ears, but his blind eyes stayed on the shape rising towards the sky.
A serpent. Scaled and deranged. Liam's HellSlayer's Monster had awakened.
THUD!
Rollan crashed into the floor, hitting the ground hard enough to feel the sharp earth stabbing into his back despite his armor.
[65% HP Remaining (1950/3000)]
Rollan froze suddenly as his world continued to move despite him laying still. He looked off to his right suddenly in response to the sounds of animalistic roars.
Ursula stood alone on the head of the creature they both occupied. In her partially shifted state, she hacked away at the back of its massive neck with her ice axes as the Monster roared and shook it's massive head in pain.
He suddenly stood up, realizing he'd landed on a Primal of disastrous proportions.
As Ursula roared at the Primal and threw iced spikes at the HellBred below, Rollan surveyed the field.
Back on the canyon, the monstrous Serpent broken free from within Liam fought for control over itself.
The Primal he rode seemed unaffected by it's presence. Too busy smashing and swallowing HellBred and Wild-thing alike. Behind it all, Claude and a small pack of Monsters faced off against two significant Demons.
He was losing. They were enjoying it.
He jumped off the Primal suddenly, activating his (Slash) ability mid-air to nearly teleport across the battlefield and land beside Claude in the grassed over sands.
"Who's your friend, Clllaude?" Cyrene cooed-- slightly exhausted and in pain from the slashes to her face and body, as she licked his blood off of her blade, causing her to shiver violently.
"Rollan Ligneore." Rollan replied casually before sending a healing wave through the earth.
He heard Claude sigh as his wounds closed.
"On your feet, Monsieur. They won't wait up for you." Rollan said, placing a hand on his shoulder as the Monsters stood at the ready in front of them.
Claude rose up off the ground. To Rollan's surprise, the PitGnoll's arm lay in the grass beneath him. He tossed it to the side, never taking his eyes off of Cyrene.
Rollan was taken aback for a moment at how focused he looked. Almost trance-like. Never taking his eyes off them, never speaking. His breaths were deep and his body remained controlled-- despite his completely transformed state.
As if that wasn't enough of a surprise, a sudden green cloak of energy surrounded him. Imperfect, flickering in and out of existence like a flame in a blizzard. But when it was there, it slowly healed his wounds, primed his muscles and grew the nature around him. He was using his Elemental Shroud.
"Fight..."
The Monsters ahead took off at his words. Claude dropped down to a squat, sinking his hands into the earth to heal them as they faced off against the Demons.
Rollan never knew it was so satisfying to watch someone grow in real time. Maybe it was what drove the Druids that taught him. Bless them.
"Rollan." Claudes eyes never left Cyrene. Even as the Primal ravaged the lands in the distance and the Serpent fought against Liam to wreak havoc along with it.
"Monsieur?"
"I can't let us die."
He sounded so far away. In mind and body. A beast, as calm as a faraway forest, and yet he stood in a battlefield.
"I won't let us die. But no matter how hard we fight, we'll die. I can't....."
"Monsieur?"
"I can end it all right here, Rollan. I can kill them all. I can burn them off the face of the earth."
The anger crept in. He shoved it down, continuing to heal the Monsters.
"What do you mean?"
"Do you have the Ancient Seeds?"
Rollan suddenly realized what Claude was planning. It was psychotic-- absolutely mindless..... and just about the only thing that could clear the field in one shot.
He suddenly wished he hadn't told him the story of his old friend Lilith and the Vampire.
"Do you have the seeds!" Claude snapped.
Rollan nodded.
Claude was on his feet in a flash with his hand out. Eyes still on Cyrene who tried to reach him only to be forced into battle with a Satyr and Banshee who were about as persistent as Gnats in the blistering summer heat.
As he spoke his final words before entering combat, a small forest rose from the earth, spreading like fire.
"Help me save them, Rollan. Help me avenge the ones I couldn't."
His words were finalized by the massive HellSlaying Serpent soaring overhead and smashing into the battlefield.
