Power Awakens

Svelte and Petrek entered the Library together, both had been witness to events from different vantage points, both had used fast horses to travel the short distance to the keep. As they entered the Archduke looked up from an old text he had been reading.

“I’m afraid the Nexii prophecy isn’t going to help us kill this monster my Lord,” said Petrek breathlessly. “There is no mention of a Demolt in that text.”

“You are quite learned, Petrek, how did you manage to get hold of a copy of the Nexii prophecy, I was lead to believe they were very rare?” queried the Archduke.

“A passing Storyteller that I helped one day when his wagon broke down near my home, I saved him from a couple of bandits that had snuck close to the Westden suburb, they almost killed him, but luckily for him and me, I happened by on one of my circuits of the town, he gave it to me in gratitude, of course at the time I had no idea what it was, and I refused to take it at first, but he insisted, I reported it to the Lieutenant but he told me to keep it, he never was one for reading and they are only extracts from the prophesy, or so the storyteller said. It won’t help us kill this beast, Fraykus is dead my Lord, crushed where he stood by the beast and now the Demolt is only a few minutes away from the keep.”

“I’m at a loss Petrek, I don’t mind saying. I don’t know what to do, this thing seems indestructible, Fraykus was our only hope, Baln bless his soul he was a loyal friend”. The archduke looked tired and defeated. “As Fraykus had nominated your boy as a Nexii, I was hoping there was something in this text which might help, a fools hope, I know that now.”

A small commotion at the door of the Library saw Jonin and a very dusty traveller enter the Library,

“My Lord, this man claims he may be able to help,” said Jonin as he gestured at the weary traveller.

“Who are you sir?” asked the Archduke.

In a strange accent the figure announced, “My name is Osakee, my Lord, I was the Abbot of the Westron Mountain Tongsai Monastery, however, I am now Quest bound. My sword is the legendary Harvester, for which I am custodian although I will soon relinquish it to its new master.” Osakee bowed his whole torso to the Archduke, and this was followed by a slightly deeper bow to a very surprised Jaac, “Nexii” was all that Osakee said.

“Harvester” murmured the Archduke, “I thought it was a legend, too many legends have come true today, it is said it can cut through any matter when wielded by a Master, it is also said that all Haittee Abbots, or former Abbots are Masters of Arts Martial, your timing is impeccable Osakee, a creature from legend a Demolt is attacking the keep and nothing can harm it, it seems to be coming straight for me, though I cannot understand why?”

“Not you Lord” replied Osakee as again he looked towards Jaac, “Its after the Nexii, he above all must be protected. I have come to offer what aid I must.”

“I hope we will have the opportunity to talk later, it seems you know more about what is happening than any of my subjects, now it seems I need your help.” said the Archduke.

“I go with the Nexii Lord, it is his wishes I will obey”

“Well Jaac,” replied the Archduke, “What will you have a Master Swordsman do with an unstoppable blade. It appears the Demolt is after you and not me, meanwhile it is destroying the keep and killing my soldiers”

All eyes turned to Jaac, including his fathers, Jaac blushed, he felt as though he was glowing red, he had never had this much attention before, and didn’t know what to do. Without thinking through the consequences Jaac turned to the Archduke

“I think Lord that we need to kill the Demolt outside before it reaches here. Once it’s in the keep, I don’t see what no blade is going to do, it will be chaos”

“Good thoughts boy, you may go far,” replied the Archduke

“Osakee if you are to tackle this beast, then the open area before the Library will give you the most room, shall we go?”

Osakee looked at Jaac and pointed to the door “Shall we. I only go where the Nexii goes, if you want me to tackle this monster, then I will need to keep you in sight, you are my Quest now. Don’t worry you can stand at the top of the stairs to this Library, I don’t expect you to come down to the area in front of the doors”

“Ok” said Jaac, not quite sure yet what was going on. He needed time to think and away from all this chaos. It didn’t appear he was going to get it any time soon though. With a sigh he moved to where Osakee was gesturing and stopped at the top of the Library Steps. His father and the others moved to the right of the Library complex whilst Osakee moved to fifteen paces in front of the keep wall where an almighty rhythmic thudding noise came. The pounding echoed on the ears as the crash of the Demolt against the wall showered bits of dust and stone into the air.

With an almighty boom a large section of the keep wall imploded. A huge mushroom cloud of dust forty paces high blossomed into the evening sky and huge chunks of rubble and stone clattered to the ground a mere five paces from where Osakee stood. A slight breeze quickly dispersed the dust cloud and crunching over the rubble came the creature from a nightmare.

It paused, looked at Jaac and then looked at Osakee.

The Demolt, a little fatigued after its demolition of the keep wall saw the object of its mission. The aura of the human was incredibly bright, one of the brightest the Demolt had ever seen in its five thousand year existence. It hurt its sensors, which were already damaged and made the creature flinch slightly away from the brightness. Just as the Demolt made to move towards the human, it noticed another two bright auras, one of a human standing not ten paces away and in its hand an unmaker. The Demolt recognized the unmaker as one it had fought alongside in the War of Attrition when the Master had held the Werd of command for all the Demolt. The Master had held the unmaker then and the Demolt had seen it cleave through two of his brethren whose Werd of Command was held by the opposing human army. The human of the opposing army also had an unmaker, its aura shining as bright as the Master. But the Master prevailed and shortly after the Demolt was commanded to wait in the cave, for five hundred years, now it faced an unmaker and for the second time in its existence, it saw a weapon, which could kill it. The human holding the unmaker had a strong aura; it outshone all but the target by quite some way. What this entailed the Demolt did not know, it knew only destruction and killing.

The Demolt attacked the newcomer with an incredible powerful flick of its spike tail aiming for the human’s middle. Incredibly the human leaped into the air before the tail struck and slashed a mighty blow against the Demolt’s tail, incredible pain blossomed in the Demolt’s sensor stalks as two paces of tail was cleaved from its body. This human was dangerous, could it be protecting the target, the Demolt would have to try a different tact, it was used to using its incredibly strong body to bluster and blunder through battles, however, this didn’t mean the Demolt was not also intelligent, it had not always been used so.

Jaac couldn’t believe the speed of the strike by the Demolt, but he was more impressed with the speed of Osakee, who appeared to leap into the air even before the tail had started moving. On his way back down Osakee had used a double-handed overhead strike to cut the tail in two, incredible.

As Osakee faced off towards the beast, the Demolt surprised everyone by lunging sideways past Osakee and crashing into a stone pillar. At first Jaac couldn’t understand what was happening until he realised that the pillar the Demolt had just destroyed was the supporting pillar of the steps he was standing on, with a loud crack the cantilevered stairs snapped and tumbled Jaac in front of the Demolt. As Jaac lay there winded, Osakee screamed at him, he threw Harvester at Jaac “Catch Harvester” he screamed “gut its underside and roll out”

Time seemed to slow, Jaac had noticed this phenomenon before, the sword flew towards Jaac and Petrek screamed “nooo.”

The Demolt reached up to take the unmaker in its claw, it grabbed the blade as it flew toward the human underneath it, more pain as the blade sliced through all three claws.

Jaac reached out, he plucked the blade out of the air and with all his strength he hacked into the underside of the Demolt as he rolled from underneath its belly. Surprisingly as Jaac slashed the blade across the Demolt’s belly he met no resistance and the blade went in up to the hilt cutting a slash a pace and a half long and a sword length deep. Jaac rolled up to his feet Blade in his hand.

The Demolt felt the unmaker cut across its central sensor stork, as it passed through the stork the pain ceased, the Demolt collapsed, and its long life was ended.

A bath full of greeny yellow fluid gushed onto the floor of the clearing in front of the library. The Demolt didn’t move.

Petrek ran across to his son, tears in his eyes “Jacko, I thought I’d lost you for a moment.” said Petrek as he held his son.

The Archduke walked across to Jaac and Petrek. “Now Petrek, Jaac, about that chat we need to have, let’s adjourn to my chambers, there is a lot happening here that I don’t understand. Osakee, boys, Taegan would you join us, Svelte, Jonin you too. Jonin send for someone to clean this up before you join me please. ” The Archduke set off towards his Chambers followed by the strange ragtag retinue.