917 - The Ghost Blade
“I want to be our people’s greatest hunter, so that I can serve as the avatar of Solonor Thelandira, as my father once did!”
Enaestari had laughed loudly at that. “You don’t lack for ambition, do you?”
Loraestil had stamped his foot then, glaring up at what he’d thought was mockery. “It’s not ambition! It’s dedication!”
Her wings flapping, Enaestari shook her head, her broad grin not wavering as she looked down at him. But not looking down on him, he’d realized centuries later. “If all you have is dedication, then that’s not good enough for me to teach you.”
“Then tell me what is good enough, and I’ll do that!”
Enaestari cocked a brow at him, smile still in place. “Well, since you’re not an avariel like me, you’d need to start by growing wings. That’s the only way you’ll ever be able to master our style of bladesinging, you know.”
“I’ll adapt it! I’ll start a new style, translating yours into one that I can use even without wings!”
Another laugh came from the winged elf then. “I suppose that’d seem like a small thing to someone who wants to be the mortal vessel of a god, but I don’t think you’re ready for how much work that would take.”
“I am! I’m more than ready! Please...”
Loraestil recalled how his shoulders had slumped then, gritting his teeth as he hung his head. “I want to make my father proud of me, but I don’t have his skill with a bow. No matter how much I practice, everyone says I’m nowhere near as good as he was when he was my age...”
Tears gathering at the corners of his eyes, he’d met Enaestari’s gaze head-on, stomping his foot as he clenched his fists. “But my skill with a sword is real! I’ve never lost a duel, and my tutors all say that there’s nothing left for them to teach me! I’ve even received an invitation to be taught by the Istvelen’areth himself!”
“Really?” Even Enaestari looked impressed by that. “So why are you here requesting to be my student if the head if the principal of the bladesinger academy wants to recruit you?”
“Because my father said you once defeated him in battle!”
That had resulted in the winged elf grimacing, one hand going to cover her face in embarrassment. “That wasn’t a battle. It wasn’t even a formal duel. It was a demonstration of our respective bladesinging styles that got slightly out of hand.”
“You still disarmed him! That means you won!”
“That’s not-”
“I want to be the best of the best, someone that no one can defeat! Just like my father! Just like you!”
That had been when Enaestari’s smile had fallen away, and she’d folded her wings, landing down so she could face at him at eye-level. “Loraestil, if you’re looking for a warrior that can never be defeated, then there’s no one in all of Arvandor – no, in all of Creation – who’s qualified to be your teacher.”
He could still remember how surprised he’d been by that. “You mean...there’s someone out there who’s better than you with a sword?”
She’d snorted then – in a manner that was as unladylike as it was un-elf-like – and drawn her blade, holding it out in front of him. “Do you know what this is?”
He was sure his eyes had to have been sparkling, immediately recognizing the blade by how it couldn’t be seen if you looked directly at the cutting edge of the blade, so thin it was as though it only existed in two dimensions. “Of course I do! That’s Uskeche’Kerym, the ‘Ghost Blade’ that you used to cleave your way through the Crawling Jungle and slay the demon lord Azuvidexus, the Ravenous Maw!”
“Correct. And do you know how I acquired it?”
His featured had twisted in confusion then, and in hindsight he was grateful at how his future teacher hadn’t laughed at his expression. “‘Acquired it’? I...I thought that you’d created it?”
Enaestari put the sword away then, putting one hand on her hip – in a way that he’d see her do countless times after that, when she began his training – as she gave him a penetrating look. “I won it,” she said plainly. “By defeating the worst of the best.”
He’d only grown more confused by that. “I...don’t understand...”
She’d hesitated for a moment, before huffing and reaching up to scratch her head. “I guess there’s no harm in telling you, since you’re going to be my student from now on.”
He almost didn’t catch that last part, the casual way she’d mentioned that she’d grant his request catching him completely off-guard. “Wait, you mean-”
“Listen closely!” The commanding tone in her voice quieted him instantly. “A long time ago, your father and I...well, let’s just say that if you ever find a magic item called a ‘well of many worlds,’ don’t use it unless you’re in really, really deep trouble, since it sends you to a random spot on a random plane of existence.”
Loraestil recalled being curious to know exactly what sort of trouble could have forced his father and Enaestari to use something that sounded so dangerous, but he’d known better than to interrupt, not wanting her to change her mind about taking him as her apprentice.
“Anyway,” she’d continued, “I’m still not sure what plane we ended up on – I think it might have been someone’s private demiplane, but I’m not sure – but we found ourselves in a wasteland, with graves as far as the eye could see. Each one was marked with a sword, and the only other thing there was a massive coliseum.”
She’d sighed then, her expression turning pensive. “I’m still not sure what would have happened if we’d tried to rob any of those grave markers – since each of the swords had magical auras so bright I almost went blind looking at them – but your father was the one who noticed that those auras got stronger the closer we got to the coliseum. And you know what we found when we finally went inside that huge arena?”
He’d shaken his head, already wide-eyed at the tale.
“Exactly one hundred people. Members of all different races – humans, elves, catfolk, lizardmen, and more than a few I didn’t recognize – all practicing their sword forms; students waiting for their master to emerge from seclusion. And all wearing white cloaks with a number on them.”
“A number?” The question had slipped out before he could help it, leaving him suddenly nervous at his breach of etiquette.
Fortunately, Enaestari hadn’t seemed to care, nodding. “Each one different, from one to one hundred. Their way of keeping track of who outranked who in their hierarchy.”
Loraestil had been spellbound by that point, imagining his father and Enaestari having fought their way through the hundred students before facing their secluded master. It was only later that he’d recall how he’d forgotten the anecdote that she’d begun the story with.
“Naturally, when I found out that they were students of the sword, I had to challenge them,” murmured his avariel instructor, seemingly lost in the memory. “I was so young and stupid then, full of ambition, just like you...”
She’d paused for a long time then, before eventually shaking her head again. “Anyway, it turned out that they welcomed challengers, but you had to fight your way up the ranks. So, I faced off against number one hundred, a human warrior who looked like he was no more than two or three decades old.”
“I bet he was nothing compared to you!” blurted Loraestil, something he still cringed to remember now.
Enaestari gave him that penetrating look again. “I barely survived.”
That had brought him up short. “Huh?”
“Oh, I won the fight, reducing him to nothing more than a patch of mist that had to return to his coffin – he was a vampire, it turned out, and had been practicing sword forms when my great-grandparents were still children at play – but I lost both of my wings, my left arm, my right eye, and ended up skewered through the aorta, in the process. I only survived to celebrate my victory because your father was there.”
Loraestil hadn’t been able to speak, stunned that the elf whom his father had described as the greatest bladesinger in generations had been so thoroughly defeated...and by the weakest member of whatever order she’d found!
“As it turned out, winning earned me a choice of prizes,” Enaestari had continued, chuckling once more. “I could either take the place of the guy I’d defeated as disciple number one hundred, or I could take one of the swords in the graves surrounding the coliseum – albeit only at the very edge, where the weakest swords were placed – and leave.”
It had taken him a moment to realize what she was hinting at, and when he finally understood his eyes had widened. “You mean... Uskeche’Kerym?”
She’d nodded, her jovial expression having taken on a slightly bitter cast. “That’s where the Ghost Blade comes from: my reward for defeating the lowest-ranked member of the strongest warrior sect that I’ve ever met.”
She’d sheathed the blade then, giving it a flashy twirl before returning it to its scabbard, her bitter expression evaporating like mist in the morning light. “And it’ll be yours someday, if you can actually refine avariel-style bladesinging into a form that can defeat me.”
If he’d been shocked before by her casually accepting him as a student, he’d been absolutely flabbergasted at that point, staring at her in openmouthed astonishment. “You...you’ll give Uskeche’Kerym...to me?!”
“A little motivation to make sure you’re as dedicated as you say you are,” she teased, throwing him a wink. “But since that might take a little time, and I don’t want you to use your motivation, I’ll let you in on a little secret once you perfect your first stance.”
“What secret?” In hindsight, Loraestil had completely lost his composure at that point, something that his teacher had always seemed to take delight in.
Case in point had been the way she’d grinned at him then. “Why it’s really called the Ghost Blade...”
That had been centuries ago, and yet even now, Loraestil couldn’t help but think of that day on those rare occasions when he had to use the Ghost Blade’s true power.
The way he was about to now.
“C’mon you knife-eared little chump!” roared the pony titan, throwing gravity-enhanced punch after punch. “Hit me with your best shot, ‘cause you’re not gettin’ up again after I hit you with mine!”
Loraestil managed to dodge around each of them, using the Stance of the Diving Roc to dodge. The form was designed for fighting in environments of extreme chaos, where footing was not only unstable, but actively chaotic. It was supposed to be used while aboard a ship in stormy weather, or atop a flying mount that was engaged in aerial combat. But it was just as useful against a foe who used gravity to draw their enemy toward their punches.
But only barely. If nothing else, Loraestil had to admit that Lex Legis had an impressive command of his musclebound physique. Despite the fact that the additional gravity was weighing him down, he seemed to be moving faster as the fight went on, swinging in a surprisingly-intricate series of punches, one leading directly into another with no sense that he was growing tired, let alone slowing down.
Not only that, but he’s deliberately stepping in a way that’s designed to maximize the damage to the landscape, as well as causing tremors right as he throws each punch. If he hadn’t spent centuries perfecting his fighting style – one that translated the freedom of aerial movement into a ground-based series of stances – then Loraestil knew he probably would have been pulled into Lex Legis’ punches and obliterated by now.
And with how the stallion seemed to be generating more gravity with each passing moment, that future would likely come to pass in the next few minutes.
Which was why Loraestil’s next attack to be the one that ended the conflict.
Even as he danced around his enemy’s furious attacks, Loraestil silently murmured the words to activate Uskeche’Kerym’s hidden power, reciting the incantation that Enaestari had taught him the day he’d finally bested her in a duel.
In his hands, the Ghost Blade began to glow softly.
The light wasn’t bright, and even if it had been full dark Loraestil knew that it would have been as dim as a candle. But what made the sight arresting was how the glow seemed to hang in the air after he’d swung the sword, leaving a phantom trail to mark its passage which lingered for several seconds. To anyone who didn’t know the truth about the sword, it probably just looked like a pretty lightshow.
But to Loraestil, it was a sign that the weapon was ready.
“You asked for my best shot, cur?”
“What, you finally remembered how to swing that thing now that it’s glowin’?” snorted the titan. “C’mon! I’m getting’ bored over here!”
“Then allow me to relieve you of your boredom. Permanently.”
“Bring it!”
Moving into the Stance of the Shrieking Jubjub – a bird whose childish name belied a fierce and deadly nature – Loraestil raised the Ghost Blade high, then rushed forward.
At the same time, Lex Legis hooted in delight and swung at him with a punch so laden with gravity that it seemed to cause the air to contort around it...and to Loraestil’s surprise, the air burst into flame an instant later, the magically-enhanced force of the blow igniting the atmosphere around it. The fires leaped out despite the inward pull surrounding the titan’s hoof, flaring into a wide corona of heat which made a raging inferno seem like a pleasant hearth in comparison.
That was wrong, Loraestil knew. He had magic items on his person to protect against heat damage, and even if they didn’t offer total immunity to high temperatures, they were still powerful enough that anything short of total immersion in lava or the breath of an ancient red dragon should have been hard-pressed to hurt him. Even then, the damage would have been vastly reduced. And yet now, a single explosion of flame felt unnaturally hot; even though he hadn’t touched it yet, he could feel his flesh already starting to burn, and knew that if he didn’t break off his attack in that moment, he’d suffer terrible injury even if he managed to avoid the punch itself...
“I won the fight... I lost both of my wings, my left arm, my right eye, and ended up skewered through the aorta, in the process.”
Enaestari’s words gave Loraestil the courage to grit his teeth, holding back a scream as he moved through the flames, feeling his flesh wither and blacken as it caught fire. Instead, he focused on avoiding the punch itself, feeling the rush as the stallion’s hoof sailed by him with the force of a falling comet as he managed to avoid its path.
Then he brought Uskeche’Kerym around.
The Ghost Blade passed directly through Lex Legis’ torso, leaving the soft glow behind as it cut directly through the stallion.
There was no resistance to the swing, as was characteristic of a sword whose blade had no thickness. But this time, Loraestil knew that it wasn’t just because of how sharp the sword was. Indeed, as he opened his scorched eyelids, he knew that there wouldn’t be an additional mark on the titan’s body.
And yet, his enemy was lying crumpled on the ground, unmoving and unseeing.
And above him was the spectral form that was Lex Legis’ benighted soul, a shocked expression on his face.
The Ghost Blade had once again lived up to its name, delivering a strike that had cut the connection between his enemy’s body and their soul.
Now all that was needed was to capture the latter before it moved off to whatever horrific afterlife awaited it. Fortunately, he had an apprentice High Mage who’d be able to take care of such paltry details now that he’d done the hard work.
Tapping his healing belt again, Loraestil gave a relieved sigh as it reduced the burns...only for it to stop before it had finished, its power expended. Grimacing, he put the issue of the unusual nature of the titan’s flames aside as he looked at his levitating compatriot. “Vysta-”
He didn’t have a chance to finish as someone appeared in the middle of the battlefield.
Loraestil sensed them an instant before he saw them, a wave of pressure reaching out to bear down on him in a way that had nothing to do with gravity. It was as though everything had just grown slightly darker, the air turning colder, as a powerful sense of malevolence spread out to engulf the area, one far darker than any demon or devil that he’d ever hunted.
All of which was coming from the figure now standing in the midst of Thilaera’s summoned creatures.
He might have been called a unicorn, if that term could have been applied to something that looked as though it had emerged from a demon’s nightmares. His horn was redder than blood, and his slit-pupiled eyes glowed green, with purple flames sprouting from their outer corners. His tail was thick and fleshy, his bared teeth were sharp, and where his hooves should have been were sharp claws. Even more horrifying was his left foreleg, which was a tangled mass of barbed wires that had been twisted into an approximation of the limb it replaced.
By themselves, none of those details would have moved Loraestil much, having faced down agents of both Hell and the Abyss. But there was more to the newcomer than just his physical features.
There was an aura about him, one which made his presence impossible to ignore. It made Loraestil feel as though he was trapped in a confined space alongside the unicorn, and with every move the red-horned creature made, Loraestil was pushed further and further into a corner. The air itself seemed to congeal, as if it didn’t want to move lest it draw the unicorn’s attention. Certainly, that was the case with all of Thilaera’s summons, who were standing frozen as they stared at the intruder with wide eyes.
But he didn’t look at any of them.
Instead, he looked only at the she-wolf they’d been fighting.
She was in a sorry state, the black armor she’d been wearing beneath the ice golem she’d conjured around herself cracked and broken. The elementals that she’d summoned to defend herself had all been torn to shreds, and she wasn’t much better, bleeding from several small wounds and a few more serious ones, clearly on her last legs.
But alone of all the people on the battlefield, she smiled as she caught sight of the monstrous equine, stumbling forward to meet him.
He was at her side in an instant, catching her in a surprisingly gentle motion, holding her up as though she weighed nothing at all, making her one remaining eye sparkle.
“Missed you, Lex,” she murmured.
And suddenly, Loraestil realized two things.
The first was that he’d made the most humiliating error a hunter could make: he’d mistaken someone else for his quarry. Now he knew why the musclebound stallion he’d just defeated had called himself “Burly” before!
And second, that his true target’s arresting presence had caused Loraestil to overlook a crucial detail:
Lex Legis hadn’t come to the battlefield by himself.
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I genuinely enjoyed the build up of Loraestil's backstory only for his moment of triumph to be met with the 'pie in the face' that was Lex's entrance into the battlefield. Given the situation, I highly doubt any attempt for diplomacy will be entertained by either party. The most I expect would be Lex demanding the reason for their actions and depending on their response through his precognition, he could nip any attacks in the bud, including a strike from the Ghost Blade.
Speaking of which, the sword's ability is rather interesting since it can essentially take down any foe regardless of how strong they are. Though I'm guessing that it's effective only if it hits the enemy when its effect is activated...and that its target has a soul to severe from its body. Though I wonder how effective it would be against a titan who has help from other titans though how many of them is unknown.
As desperate as they are, I think that not all of them joined Lex and are possibly on the fence with him given how abrupt any negotiation he might have been doing in his pocket dimension, by which I mean Kara since she has a vested interest in the lesser titans joining Lex.
If the weakest of the blades that wernt even used is something that has such an effect, I wonder just how Marvel DC DBZ rediculous the various higher level weapons would have to get and the excuses as to why the warriors demiplane hadnt collapsed under the strain of the weapons egos?
True Ressurection works if the soul isnt captured or fast enough before the soul gets claimed etc? Though would Burley be downgraded if he became a Lich or Wight or similar?
I can't believe that you used the "just as the character won, something worst happened at that moment that invalidate the success" on someone other than Lex. I was pretty sure only Lex had that luck. But not anymore. Someone else has to become fate's punching bag now.
11829158
It's rather refreshing, isn't it?
11829064 Yeah, Loraestil quite literally had no idea who he was messing with.
Of course, he's not likely to take that well, since even though he took Burly down (or did he?) he seems to regard attacking the wrong person at a point of humiliation, given that he was going on this hunt entirely to boost his standing in order to open more opportunities for himself. Given that he doesn't trust Vystalaran and Thilaera not to gossip about how things went here, he's going to need to take Lex down if he wants to come away from this looking like the badass he wants to.
Of course, he's probably going to rely on the Ghost Blade to carry the day, since as you noted it seems to let him one-shot a foe. Then again, that likely does have some limitations to it, not just about the issue of having a soul, but also simply in terms of activation and usage. Otherwise, why not lead with that power/use it all the time? Still, it's clearly a force to be reckoned with...at least for most creatures. We'll see if that's true for Lex.
As for who Lex brought back with him, well...that remains to be seen.
11829131
Oh, I'd say they're pretty notable in how ridiculously powerful they are. And remember, those are the ones that the guys in the coliseum apparently didn't want to bother with!
Remember that part about how the one hundred disciplines are waiting for their sect leader to emerge from seclusion? Just imagine how tough that individual has to be if even the number one guy there is still just a student compared to them.
11829158
11829701 There's a joke to be made here about Loraestil being the hero of his own story, which is a bad thing for him because I tend to pull the rug out from under the protagonists that I write about.
The more serious answer is that I have a strong urge to make my protagonists underdogs, regardless of how strong they are. I normally consider that a good thing, but there's something to be said for the enjoyment that comes from seeing them take everything that they've earned – the power, the weapons, etc. – and just cut absolutely loose all over some poor stupid sons of bitches who had no idea what they're getting into. Sure, it's gratuitous, but it's well-earned gratuity, and isn't that what really matters?