Jackal Among Snakes

If Anneliese were to analogize being in the tephramancer’s storm of basalt with Llewellen’s [Life Cycle] empowering her, a perfect example came to mind at once. If she had been walking on the land as a B-rank mage, now she was swimming through a still ocean as a fish might. Up, down, or any direction she pleased—if she made the effort, she could reach it.

With magic pouring into her being faster than she could hope to use it, Anneliese sped alone through the black clouds of tephra. Partially concealed by illusion magic, she used her enchanted boots to propel her advance, heading closer and closer to the pounding boom of the tephramancers striking the earth. Her heart beat with their primal rhythms, stoking her boldness further and further like a flame in a dry forest. Anneliese prided herself for remaining calm, but that had no place here.

What few tribals blocked Anneliese’s advance she broke with a relentless barrage of magic. The tribal’s steel sung in tandem with their cries of war, cutting, stabbing, and gouging… but none met their mark. She danced beyond their range, employing illusion magic to further confuse them, then sent cold blades of her own. The Veidimen were born in the ice, and the sheer cold of her people’s ancestral magic sent them to an unmarked grave with frozen soil.

When Anneliese’s spells met flesh, she felt her magic flourish like a cut stem budding another a thousand times over. Their death fueled her life. Her focus was sharp enough that nothing seemed to escape her notice—not a soul came near to harming her. Such a thing was only possible because of her complete mobility in the confusion of the storm.

Her unrelenting advance towards the drumming led her to its first source. The woman readied for Anneliese the moment she was spotted, and her staff banged against the earth. Anneliese sent a spear of ice at her foe the moment she was able, yet a basalt shield rose to defend. The spear pierced it… and the ash degraded, the magic keeping it solid now sapped away by Anneliese’s spell.

Anneliese continued her unrelenting assault, sending wind, fire, and ice in waves at her foe who defended with that unyielding tephramancy booming against the earth. What magic she called forth was soon replaced. This is how Argrave feels, Anneliese realized, recalling well his state of destructive focus when he used his Blessing of Supersession. It feels as though the strength of the world is at my back, making all bend before me.

Eventually, the enemy slipped, and Anneliese finished the tephramancer with the B-rank [Glacier’s Garrote]. Innumerable knives of ice bound in a chain sprung from Anneliese’s hand and wrapped around the caster, then squeezed inwards until she was pierced a hundred times over. The moment she died, the storm waned slightly, and Anneliese felt the ambient magic dim slightly.

The roar of a crowd alerted her to foes coming. She turned and cast [Icebound Twinblades] without a moment’s thought. Two ice arms bearing blades as tall as a person appeared, then spun in a deadly whirlwind that cut through them all with ease. What few that did not lie dead fled immediately back to where the storm was denser.

Anneliese continued onwards without a beat for rest, hunting the next with the same reckless abandon. Cutting through dozens more and routing twice as many, she found the next. This one’s defense was a little weaker. As their number faded, so too did their power wane. She sent the cold ice of her ancestors, the roaring fire, the howling wind… and froze them, burnt them, cut them. Her adept maneuvering and skillful illusions ensured her safety—a costly feat of magic sustainable only because of the great wealth of ambient magic spawned by this tephramantic storm.

As Anneliese’s hunt continued, her foes grew ready for her assaults. They resisted Anneliese, trying strategies against her. Two tephramancers grouped, their song of war beating in tandem as they used the tephra to kill her. Yet for every blade they sent at her, Anneliese could return one of her own. The warriors threw their weapons or tried to surround her. Every one of them only met their end, replenishing her fluctuating magic.

The dancer, they called her in fear. The Stormdancer. The title came from foe and friend alike, both witness to her feats all the same.

The tephramancers and their beating staves dimmed in numbers again and again and again… yet as the tephramancy waned, so too did the surge of magic pouring into Anneliese. She fought weaker foes with feebler defenses, yet she herself was weakened in kind.

It mattered not. Their great booming magic was three, and still she hunted. The battles began to blend together in her head. She sent an illusionary form of herself towards her foe, then stole around from the back and ended him with a spike of ice through the head. When he met the ground, dead, they were two. The twisting blackness shrouding all vision faded, and Anneliese already moved towards her second to last quarry.

The next attacked her with weak, rapid attacks aggressively, slamming his staff upon the ground in a desperate march of fear. She blocked patiently, receiving the now-weak blows with lesser wards. Each time the ward was hit, her magic was replenished. She caught a gap in his rhythm, then struck him down with the B-rank lightning spell [Cloudborn Chain]. Then, the drums were one.

The tephramancy began to die, the writhing mass unable to persist from the magic of one man. It shrunk in size, focusing around the last drumming tephramancer in the far distance. With it shrinking so, all around were revealed—hundreds of tribesmen and knights locked in combat. They saw her standing alone, and she turned her head waiting to see which came… but none approached.

Soon enough, even the last beat faltered. When the curtain of basalt fell to the earth, its power gone, it revealed the one beyond. A man leaned on his staff, staring at the scene with wide eyes. The barbarians of Vysenn fell into disarray with their song of war gone. Basalt fragments fell to the earth, blanketing the ground until nothing below was visible.

To take the place of their foe’s song… the first crackle of electricity echoed out, following by a scream of pain. Anneliese, unharried, looked to the distance. Sparking constructs rose to the night sky, replacing the storm lost with another. There, it was another’s time. It was Argrave’s time.

#####

The barbarians of Vysenn were only human.

It had been difficult to remember that fact earlier. Their skin looked glossy and hard, truly like alabaster. They didn’t flinch at losing limbs, and they were so unrelenting in their assault as to appear inhuman. Their strength was difficult to contest, and doubly so with their blood pumping hot from the tephramancy whirling about.

“Fall back!” Galamon shouted, his voice so loud as to cut past all the noise Argrave made. “Everyone, fall back!”

With their commander’s words, the men obeyed in mute shock, pliable in wake of the sudden end of the storm. The barbarians of Vysenn had charged towards their line relentlessly. But now, Argrave advanced into them, the Blessing of Supersession fueling his frenzy. And as they bled, burned, screamed, and fled, their humanity was abundantly clear.

Argrave called his strategy ‘sword and shield.’ His right hand—and Garm’s eyes, when needed—were his shield, blasting away all that came near with powerful magic. His left hand conjured [Electric Eels]. The constructs of electricity would attack whatever he willed. And in the black field of basalt fragments before him, targets were plentiful.

Their party had faced foes with an overwhelming advantage in power before. But humans thrived using tools, cunning, and intelligence despite relative weakness. Hunters of the past took down even mammoths with smart strategies on Earth. With the barbarians’ tool broken, their strategy cast to the wind, and their plan dismantled… the human weakness was plain to see.

Argrave wrought great destruction upon the battlefield, warding away the darkness of the night with fire and lightning. He used the knowledge they intended to kill those that would fight for him as fuel for his advance. If they had succeeded… Elenore, Durran, all of them would be dead. And that was a fine fuel for the fire he needed. The men tried to resist him, but it was like trying to extinguish a bonfire by blowing on it or plugging a hole in a dam with their arm. Soon enough, they realized that the man that came to slaughter would not stop.

The fear of one tribal became the fear of two. As two ran, four joined them. With four, the barbarians had social proof retreat was the best option. And like this, the force that had battered against theirs so relentlessly turned and ran back for the hills, blindly stumbling in the dark. But Argrave did not give them an easy escape. If the tables had been turned, the barbarians would give no mercy.

Soon enough, Argrave was alone in a field of basalt and bodies, steadily fueling the giant star of lightning above him as the last surviving barbarians fled, broken. The Blessing of Supersession died, and Argrave ceased adding to the mass of magic above. He looked up, bearing witness to the gargantuan ball of electricity, hundreds of eels swimming in and around each other. It looked like a second moon in the sky. Then, he looked down, searching for someone.

Argrave found Anneliese quickly enough, standing tall and somber just as he was. He walked to her, bathed in the blue light of his magic above.

“Anne,” he said simply, touching her shoulder.

She looked at him, saying nothing.

There was a shared camaraderie in their gazes. Neither spoke, nor wanted to speak. They turned back and walked towards the line of infantrymen. The countless infantrymen stared at him… but far more stared at the great mass of electricity far above him. The bear roared at it as though it was a moon.

“People,” Argrave called out, staring out beyond where torchlight persisted. He could hear the song of war repeated there, though played in a different pitch. Elenore would be commanding the front there. And from their position, he could tell they were losing. “We cannot rest just yet. Your brothers and sisters fight against other foes.” Argrave stepped ahead of them. “Our duty is not done yet. Follow!”

Argrave’s feet felt like stone… but still he moved, striding to fulfill the pledge he made to lead them as their king. His most trusted allies joined beside him, and just behind came their troops.