Ceremony 10

Chapter 10

Lysarias feet scuffed the stone floor sending settled dust into the air, the shadowy bear stopped its charge and turned around snarling at the cause of its pain. Shaking out her numb right arm Lysaria channelled essence and slashed at the bear with her Khopesh. The bear wasn't fast enough and dark blood covered the side of its face.

Stumbling around, Lysaria could see the long cut on the bear's leg, she was lucky her limping foe was favouring its leg or the bear would have caught her. The bear stood on hind legs and gathered dark energy pooling in a massive orb in front of its 9-foot tall frame. Lysaria was knocked back tumbling head over heels and rolled most of the way across the big room. She had the presence of mind to let go of her khopesh soo she didn't cut herself to ribbons.

Lysaria groaned sitting up leaning on her hands to stay upright, the huffing and loud bellows of the angry bear reverberated through the cave. She rolled over and watched with fascination as Thana channelled orbs of essence into the bear's unprotected rear end. Lysaria gathered her essence on her sword and thrust at the bear, A sharp line of essence crossed the gap and cut off the bear's ear.

Light take her she had wasted her opportunity, the enraged bear sent a wave of dark essence rippling out in every direction knocking her feet out from under her. Gasping she rolled and rose back to her feet again, Lysaria was angry to see Thana curled in a ball against the far wall holding her head. Lysarias heart raced and her shook with excitement, the bears gathered essence, the shadows gathering in front of its mouth preparing to finish Thana.

Lysaria shouted," Thana move" Her words went unheard the unconscious Thana unable to hear her shout. Lysaria Channeled her remaining essence into a final all-out attack, she lunged sending a beam of essence in between the shoulders of the accursed bear. The dazzling essence fought with the bears' darkness before cutting the skin and separating the bear's spine.

Cautiously moving forward She couldn't help her white-knuckled grip, the bears' dark power faded and an audible thump as the bear fell from its standing position, the bear burst into a cloud of dark essence and flowed to both her and Thana. Lysarias arm returned to its spot painfully with essence, before she sauntered to The now stirring Thana. Lysaria leaned down and smiled at the beautiful scholar.

Thana rubbed the back of her head and groaned, Her golden hair was in a mess-making her look extremely frazzled. Lysaria held out a hand and pulled the woman to her feet, Feeling warmth in her chest Lysaria wrapped her arms around the woman and said," thanks for helping I couldn't have done it without you."

letting go feeling embarrassed Lysaria shook her arms making sure everything was back to normal, she found her bloody weapon in a pile of ash and pulled the dagger out. Grimacing she wiped the sticky weapon on her torn pants and slipped it in her belt she really needed something better to hold her weapons.

Lysaria said," how much essences did you get from killing the bear?" Thanas eyes grew wide she said," I gained 150 essences, I finally have 350 essences." Lysaria said, "I only gained 100."I've reached 600 essences. Thana said," your soo lucky I can't believe you are so far ahead."

Thana walked up next to her and gestured towards the next door, in The doorway Stood Dekar reading a book. Lysaria cleared her throat noisily and didn't even get a stir from the handsome man, Walking up to him she leaned over his book waving her empty hand in front of his face.

Dakar held up one finger and said," give me a minute I need to finish this chapter, I can't believe I didn't know that there were different layers of skin I always thought it was just a single layer." Lysaria gave Thana a dumbfounded look, Her friend shrugged and she too stared at the completely unharmed albeit tired looking Dakar.

Dakar looked up from his book and tilted his head slightly before glancing around at the tattered clothes of Lysaria and Thana then back to his book. He said," It looks like you two had a much more painful challenge than I did?" Shaking his head he cut her off," And where is Hector has he came from his challenge yet?"

Lysaria replied," it looks like he was in need of saving and didn't even know it," Thana nodded her head, " Dekar said," wait you two saved me? but I wasn't in any danger." Lysaria said," we all three finished our challenges and when you didn't appear we came searching only to find that monsters corrupted by the dark were down this tunnel."

Thana said Hector got a bad gut wound and used his bell to shift out. Dakar said," I hope he is alright gut wounds are bad, the stomach acid leaks from the stomach lining and corrodes the inside causing massive pain and death if not treated. Lysaria blanched, She said," too much information I did not need to know that." Dakar couldn't take his eyes from her curved weapon he said," that's an impressive sword, how did you get a weapon that can channel essence?"

Thana blurted out," she defeated the tenth challenge!" Dakars head spun back to her admiring the weapon yet again, His light blue eyes danced over the curved blade. Lysaria looked him over from head to toe He stood there and took the treatment, She told herself to was to make sure he was unhurt, it totally wasn't to admire the handsome man.

Taking her eyes from the shorter man she glanced around making sure nothing else was sneaking up on them and not because she was embarrassed. Dakar said," what is that dark ooze?" Lysaria's eyes darted to the pool of ooze and blood.

Lysaria said," We fought a giant corrupted bear." Dakar said," Corrupted! what do you mean?" Thana said," the bear was using the power of the dark, I think this entire place is corrupted and we need to clear it out." Lysaria could see the look on the man's face, based on his look of disgust when he glanced at the ash he didn't like the dark either.

Lysaria said," why don't we clear out this place, the arbitrator must have sent us here to clean out these accursed." Her friends' expressions of disgust were clear so they all turned to the door leading deeper. Lysaria led the group with Thana following behind, and the healer Dakar in the rear.

Lysaria's curved blade was held in front of her as she crept into the small corridor leading into this bizarre place. Her mind kept wonder why these things were down here only to go back to the thought that the arbitrator set these challenges so anything was possible.

Lysaria crept around a bend and into a hallway, Lysaria almost fell into the dark pools of darkness at their feet. "light takes me, stop!." Thana and Dakar gasped, Lysarias turned watched them both turned pale in the dim light. Lysaria said," it is worse than I thought we can't allow this sort of corruption to spread."

Thana said, "The arbitrator will let the dark do as it wishes in this world if we the light don't push it back." Dakar said, "The arbitrator is just but won't take sides in our battle against the dark."Lysaria walked forward channelling essence, Her skin started glowing banishing the darkness. The wriggling dark hid back in its holes in the rock hiding from her Essence, When Thana and Dakar channelled essence the group continued on following down the tunnel through the filthy dark.

Lysaria and her group crept along the darkness infested hallway, Her khopesh held in front of her as there channelled essence warded off the dark. Clank! Clank! The disturbing clanking and clatter of claws on stone echoed down the hall, Clank!. Roarrr! A deafening roar shook the hall, echoing again and again followed by a whoof and a Clank!.

The passageway opened into a dimly lit chamber, Lysaria didn't want to touch the dark infested walls, the foul substance wouldn't hurt her a being of the light but the thought was still unpleasant. Sticking her head around the corner Lysaria froze unable to believe what she was seeing.

An enormous grizzly bear was in the middle of the room and being pulled by multiple chains, the disturbing part was the terrifying size of the beast. Lysaria came to the stunning realization that the bear she had killed earlier must have been the young of this one. This grizzly was almost twice the size of the previous bear and easily dwarfed the 5 dark figures trying to pull the bear towards a metal cage in the corner.

Lysarias heart raced wildly and she looked for any way to escape, that monstrosity of darkness, claws and teeth was not what she had come down here for. Lysaria turned to walk right back the way she came, she would find more of the dark-clad foes to fight, that monster of a bear was just too much.

Dakar and Thana were behind her smiling encouraging her forward, they were both illuminated by their essence from within, sighing Lysaria turned back, she couldn't exactly leave her team to fight the beast on their own. Resolving to thank Thank Thana and Dakar somehow for all of their support Lysaria snuck back around the corner towards the pissed-off bear.

Lysaria immediately doubter herself approaching from behind as they moved in to attack the huffing grizzly, The massive creature kept growing as they approaching renewing her doubt in their success. At least the bear was trying to swat the dark figures with its massive paws and huffing with annoyance at the massive chains holding it back.