• Published 3rd Oct 2020
  • 980 Views, 95 Comments

Dark Souls 3: Cinders of Power - Blackdrag-rose



Tirek awakens to find himself in a state of undeath, in a foreign land, and must use everything at his disposal to survive the dangers that await him.

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Firelink Shrine

Tirek had no idea how long they were actually sitting at the bonfire, readying themselves for what was coming next, but after what seemed like an hour, which was likely just two or three minutes, Sarana got up and glanced down at the path that would take them right to the entrance of the circular area they had seen when they reached the top of the hill, to which he pulled himself up and joined her. While part of him wanted to take the role of being the leader away from Sarana, since issuing orders was something he was more familiar with, he did understand that he knew absolutely nothing about this odd world, save for what she had told him so far, and suspected that he would get lost at some point if he was the only telling her where they were supposed to go, which was why he said nothing and let her take the lead. As they headed down the path that would take them directly to where the entrance of the area they had been looking at was located, so they could get this show on the road, Tirek noticed that there was another area below the where the bonfire was resting and that there just so happened to be a path that connected the one they were on to the new one he had spotted. At the end of the path they were following, which turned into a small crossroads of sorts, stood one of the grave tenders that they had fought so far, but instead of allowing it to even get close to them Tirek raised his staff and blasted it, knocking it down like the others he had loosed a spell at, taking down another enemy as they moved forward.

When they turned towards the path on their right, as that was the direction that Sarana wanted to head down, they found two more grave tenders sitting on the ground on either side of the passage, like they were tired or something, but the pair knew that they were faking, if the other grave tenders were anything to think about, so while Tirek blasted the foe on their left, and knocked him into the wall, Sarana cut down the second one in seconds. Interestingly enough there were two more grave tenders hiding behind some of the stones that were beyond the first two enemies that they spotted, but Tirek focused his magic for a moment and loosed two bolts at them, striking down both of the grave tenders before they could even reach Sarana, who simply focused on him for a moment before continuing. He wasn't expecting to be thanked for the assist, not since he didn't care and he knew that she wasn't the sort to show her emotions, so he wasn't outraged at all when she didn't thank him, rather he followed her down the rocky path they were following and even spotted yet another split, where one of the directions took them to the area they had been staring at and the other would allow them to explore an area that was below them. It didn't take Sarana long to make her decision, as she wanted to see what was on the path below them, and Tirek walked behind her, where they found two more grave tenders standing over a dead body that had a few small bomb-like items resting near it, though that was when she charged them with the intent to wipe them out, leaving Tirek to sigh as he loosed another bolt of magic from the staff and struck down the grave tender that was the closest to the body, leaving his companion to parry the incoming attack and then cut her foe down.

"So, what were they guarding?" Tirek inquired, something that was going to be happening every now and then while he was traveling with Sarana, as there was too much he didn't know about this world and knew that there was likely next to no one that would identify these items for him, so all he could do was ask the one person he actually knew and see if she knew what the items were.

"A couple of firebombs." Sarana replied, to which she stood up and tucked the bombs into a little pouch that Tirek hadn't spotted earlier, though before he could say anything she walked back up to where he was standing and started to make her way towards the other path they could have taken, "Basically, I can throw one of them at something or someone and it will explode, causing damage to an attacker or possibly setting an area on fire, if there are oil barrels nearby, so we have a way to clear out an area without engaging some enemies, depending on what's in that area."

"Interesting. Sounds like they were be useful at some point." Tirek commented, even though he really had no idea if Sarana was telling the truth or if she was pulling his leg and was just lying to him, as it was rather hard to tell when a being was lying when they had no emotions at all, though at the very least it didn't seem like she was annoyed with him as they returned to the path they happened to be following.

They discovered two more grave tenders between them and the entrance of the area that they had decided to check out, and by that Tirek found out that one was right in front of where they were standing and the second one was off to the side, to attack them from behind, so while Sarana stabbed and cut down the first one he turned around and blasted the second foe in the chest, allowing them to finish off their foes at the same time. One they were taken care of, and the pair was sure there were no more enemies in the immediate area, both Tirek and Sarana walked through the opening that was in front of them and discovered that there was a rather tall person that was currently hunched over in a kneeling position, or at least a statue made in the likeness of someone. The only reason that Tirek even considered that it was a living person was due to the rather intricate iron armor, or what he assumed was iron armor, that the being was wearing, including the halberd that was in the figure's right hand at the moment, though neither of them could see what the person looked like, due to the fact that their face was completely covered by the helmet they were wearing. Out of everything he was seeing he had to say that the oddest thing was the coiled sword that was sticking out of the being's chest, a blade that looked like the one that was in the bonfire he and Sarana sat at for a time, before coming down here, to which he glanced at his companion for a moment, especially since the only other entrance to this area seemed to be locked.

"This smells like a trap." Tirek stated, because while he might not be familiar with the workings of this world, and all of the things he had discovered so far, he could spot a trap when one happened to be staring him right in the face, as he felt that the moment one of them pulled out the coiled sword the being that it was attached to would get up and attack them, like a guardian or a judge of some kind.

"That's something I can agree with," Sarana said, showing that she actually meant what she said, though instead of worrying about the figure that was in front of them she focused on the other entrance that would allow them to head to the shrine that was off in the distance, the area that they were heading towards, and found that the door was definitely locked at the moment, which was followed by her returning to where Tirek was standing, "but it seems like we'll need to spring the trap to move on, otherwise this is where our adventure, as short as it was, will end. Are you ready?"

"A foolish question." Tirek replied, where he tapped his staff on the ground for a moment, to show that he was ready for whatever trap was waiting for them once they removed the coiled sword from the being's chest, when the reality was that he was nowhere near ready for whatever this world had the throw at them, but he had the feeling that he was going to have to adapt to what was coming in order to survive.

Sarana nodded her head for a second, showing that she was going to start moving, which was when Tirek watched as she approached the being and sheathed her own sword for a moment, where she gripped the handle of the coiled sword and carefully pulled it free from the being that it had been forced into some time ago, though the moment the weapon was freed the being shifted and started to move into a standing position. She instantly noticed that and dropped the now freed coiled sword, as she drew her own blade once more as she faced the warrior that was standing to face them, while at the same time Tirek readied his magic for what was coming next, though it wasn't long before the warrior stood at his full height and glared at them, before raising his halberd, as Tirek was sure that the being was male, and brought it down on where Sarana was standing. Fortunately she managed to roll out of the way and avoid the incoming attack, though in the same moment, while he was distracted, Tirek raised his staff and channeled a Heavy Soul Arrow, where he found that it took a little longer to charge than the normal Soul Arrow, which he sent flying through the air and let it collide with the side of their foe, seemingly damaging him in the process. It seemed that their foe didn't care about him at all and kept following Sarana around the area, jumping towards her whenever she got too far away from him, in an attempt to smash her into the ground, and whenever she was able to avoid the attack she lashed out with her own sword, letting Tirek focus on firing more of the smaller Soul Arrows at their foe.

At one point Sarana got hit with the handle of their foe's halberd and was knocked backwards, though after rolling away from the warrior she pulled out the orange Estus Flask and drank from it, healing her wounds in seconds, before she continued to attack their foe, which was what Tirek was doing, though they both stopped for a moment when he paused and shuddered for a moment... only for some sort of strange black substance to burst out of his body and wrap around his left arm, including his head, making him look even more monstrous than he had been seconds ago.

What Tirek discovered was that the move set that their foe was using really didn't change all that much, rather he had some additions to what he had been doing earlier by using his black gooey arm to pull himself around part of the area and lash out at Sarana, though where one would question why their foe was going after his companion, and not even coming at him at all, he wasn't going to do that and focused on loosing a few more Soul Arrows at the warrior. Of course that was when the warrior turned to face Tirek, despite the fact that he was focusing on Sarana, and leapt through the air, landing in front of with in a matter of seconds, barely giving him the chance to move as the halberd was swung down and cut into his chest, knocking him to the ground instantly. At first Tirek thought that the cut would have hurt and that he would have been screaming in pain, but what he discovered was that while the wound did ache a little he really didn't feel anything at the moment, meaning that he must have been cursed into the Unkindled state that Sarana was talking about, and from a glance it looked like their foe thought he was dead, which he could turn to his advantage. How he was able to do that was by charging another Heavy Soul Arrow, possibly the last attack he could manage before having to resort to using his Ashen Estus Flask to restore his magicka, so he made sure to blast the warrior in the chest with his attack and actually managed to knock it backwards, back onto the small circular area it had been resting on when they entered this area.

He and Sarana watched the warrior for a few moments, waiting to see what he did next, only for the black substance to pull back into the warrior's body and disappear, leading to their foe falling to his knees for a few seconds and then fell face first into the ground, where he burst into nothingness and left a bonfire behind for the two of them... and, at the same time, Tirek found that both he and Sarana now had fiery red spots on their bodies and their attire, like they were logs in a fire, and his wound had healed at the same time.

"What... just happened?" Tirek inquired, because that was something he had never seen before, where he got up and found that the ember-like appearance was over several parts of his body, and the same was true for Sarana, but he had no idea what to make of it, as he had never encountered any of this during his long life and figured that his companion must have some idea as to what happened.

"Our embers were restored, allowing us to regain our true strength," Sarana stated, though even as she said that Tirek didn't feel all that stronger, meaning that whatever had happened only meant restoring their power to whatever level it had been at when they died, confirming the fact that he was cursed, just like his companion was, and that it would take a long time for him to get his true strength back, before she walked over to him and stared at him, "But I have a question to ask you... why didn't you dodge that attack?"

"You must realize that this body is old and frail, hardly suited for that level of combat," Tirek replied, to which he stood up and faced his companion for a second, long enough to glare at her, before he approached the bonfire and lit the flames that came from these devices, as he determined that they might as well light all of the bonfires that they come across on their adventure, only to glance back at Sarana, who was focused on him, "now if I had my true form, on the other hand, I could have easily avoided that attack and I could have ended that fight in seconds. I will find a way to regain my old power and cast off this worthless form, but for now I'm cursed to wander the land as a old and frail shell of my former self, in terms of my body and my abilities."

"Whatever you say, old man." Sarana said, almost as if she didn't believe what he was saying at the moment, but that was when she looked around the area that they were in and spotted something interesting, even though Tirek found her picking up the discarded coiled sword for some reason, before she looked at the path they had been following, before they entered this area "Anyway, I think the way forward has been unlocked."

Tirek said nothing as Sarana lead him to the large ornate door that was on the side of the area that was opposite of the one they had entered through, where his companion rested her hands on the door and pushed, after slipping the coiled sword onto her back, allowing her to open the door and reveal a path that would take them right to the entrance of the shrine that they had spotted at the first bonfire. There was a glowing white ball in front of one of the graves to their left, where Sarana paused as Tirek investigated it, finding a broken blade of some kind, to which he shrugged and slipped it into the strange storage space that he and his companion seemed to share, as one moment the weapon was there and the next moment it had disappeared, and the only reason he was taking it was to see if there was anyone in this world that bought stuff from the Unkindled. The likeliness of such a thing was close to zero, he was sure of that, but that didn't stop him from making the attempt, even if Sarana felt he was wasting his time, but with the broken sword acquired the pair turned towards the path that was in front of them and continued to follow it, so they could enter the shrine and see what was inside it. There was a group of four grave tenders sitting on the path to the left, as the path they were following split and went in two different directions, no doubt meeting up at the same place, but instead of engaging them the pair just keep walking and ignored everything else, though they weren't allowed to do that as the grave tenders got up and lashed out at them instantly.

As such Tirek focused on blasting his pair of enemies with his magic while Sarana simply cut them down as she moved out of the way of their attacks, and once those foes were taken care of they were allowed to follow the path and head to the entrance of the shrine, though as they did that Tirek noticed that the cliff he had stared at earlier, when Sarana sat near the first bonfire, was a cliff that had a massive castle and city built on it, to which he stored the information away as he followed his companion into the shrine. The outside of the shrine looked like it was hardly maintained, save for the few torches that were on either side of the entrance, but he soon discovered that the inside was much better, as there was a set of stairs that lead down to the center of the shrine, breaking up into two paths so one could approach the center from the left or the right, though it was what was in the middle of the chamber that caught his attention. Resting in the back half of the shrine were five rather large thrones, each of them made out of stone and had some red cloth on them, no doubt for whoever sat on them, and all five of them seemed to have some sort of carving on the sides and back, to indicate who was supposed to sit on each throne, though the rather interesting part of all of this was the fact that the thrones were arranged in a half circle, with the closest two resting close to the center of the room, the next two being even higher than those two, and the final one, directly opposite of the entrance, was the highest of them all. The other interesting fact was that the thrones were of different sizes, to tell them just how tall each of the beings that sat on them were, and there just so happened to be someone on the second throne to their left, who had a crown on his head, meaning that he had to be important in some manner, but he would save that for later.

In that moment, as Sarana lead the way down to the center of the shrine, Tirek discovered a lady that was slightly taller than his companion was, happened to be wearing a black dress of some kind that came complete with parts that did cover her shoulders and the upper part of her arms, and even had an odd visor over the front of her face, as it seemed to be positioned over her eyes and the upper part of her face, but she did glance at them as they approached her.

"Welcome to the bonfire, Unkindled Ones." the lady said, addressing the pair as they came to a stop in front of her, which let Tirek spot another person that happened to be sitting on one of the steps in this area, looking totally depressed about the situation that he was in, before he returned his focus to the lady, as he was sure that she had something to tell them that was incredibly important, "I am a Fire Keeper, and I tend to the flame, just as I will tend to the both of you as you seek the Lords of Cinder, who have left their thrones and must be brought back to them, which is why I will be helping the two of you to the best of my ability."

"And how is it that you can help us?" Tirek inquired, mostly because he was lost as to what was going on, though he did like the sound of these 'Lords of Cinder', as they sounded like incredibly powerful beings that he could siphon the power of to regain what he had lost, maybe even allow him to take over this world and then return to Equus with a force that would take everything from those that beat him.

"According to the tales, a Fire Keeper can take the souls we've gathered and convert them into strength, depending on what aspect of ourselves that we want to improve," Sarana stated, showing Tirek that she knew what the lady was talking about and that she was more than willing to share what she knew about the subject, even if she felt that this was a waste of time for someone like him, or at least that was his thoughts on the matter, "and souls, from what I've heard, are the odd white bits of energy we've been gathering from each of the enemies we've taken out so far... and that warrior we just took out gave us a great deal of them."

"Iudex Gundyr was a good defender, and it is good to hear you got some souls for facing him," the Fire Keeper spoke up, informing Tirek that she was going to be talking as well, giving him an idea of what to expect in the future, before she considered what his companion was going to say next, especially with what they were talking about, "There are nine total aspects that I can empower with the souls you have acquired; Vigor, being the amount of health that each of you have so you can survive for longer periods of time in battle, Attunement, which grants you more Focus Points, Endurance, which affects your stamina and ability to dodge attacks, Vitality, an aspect that determines one's physical defense and improves a number of your resistances, Strength, which allows one to wield the heaviest of weapons and deal massive damage to their foes, Dexterity, a useful aspect that allows one to wield the more advanced types of weapons, Intelligence, which makes one's spells hit harder and raises one's magical defenses, Faith, an aspect that resonates with miracles, and finally Luck, which is a passive aspect that might influence if enemies drop anything other than souls."

Tirek stood there for a few moments, taking all that information in since it almost sounded like he was in a world were part of it sounded like a game of some kind, before sighing as he thought about the aspects of himself that he wanted to improve, since that seemed to be what Sarana was doing at the moment, showing him that they would need to do this in order to face the trials that were ahead of them. His best guess was that he wanted to improve the 'Intelligence' aspect and empower his spells, mostly due to the fact that Sarana appeared to be capable of facing whoever they came across while he stood behind her and hit them with spells, so he poured all of the souls he had acquired so far into that one part of himself. Truth be told he didn't feel that much stronger from doing that, nor did he really look all that different, but the one thing he did know was that he no longer had the souls that he possessed a few moments ago, meaning that the process must have worked, even if he didn't see any changes to himself or to his companion, which made him think about the beings that the Fire Keeper had mentioned when they first approached her. While he thought about all of that he heard Sarana mention something about Dexterity and Endurance, meaning those had to be the aspects she was going to be focusing on whenever she took her turn with the Fire Keeper, but all Tirek did was stare at the thrones and the one that had someone sitting on it, who didn't seem to be paying attention to him and his companion.

A few moments later Sarana finished up what she was doing with the Fire Keeper and walked away from her, which gave Tirek the chance to ask her something that he had been thinking about since the moment the lady had spoken to them, after they entered the shrine to be exact, and it seemed that she was willing to take a few seconds to rest before they did anything else.

"So, who are these Lords of Cinder?" Tirek asked, because he knew that there were a number of questions that he still needed to ask so he could understand what was going on with this world, especially when confronted with all of these terms that he knew nothing about, since he was sure that some of the people here expected him to know who they were talking about and might think he was a fool.

"They're figures that have linked the First Flame and prolonged the Age of Fire, becoming heroes to the people of this world in the process," Sarana replied, causing Tirek to raise an eyebrow for a moment, as that was rather interesting and he knew that, at some point, he would have to figure out what she was talking about right now, as he had no idea what the First Flame was or why the Age of Fire was important to this world, "From what I know there are four Lords of Cinder: the Abyss Watchers, Aldrich, Saint of the Deep, Yhorm the Giant, and Ludleth of Courland, who just so happens to be sitting on his throne at the moment. As you can see, there's supposed to be a fifth Lord of Cinder, a new one in the form of Prince Lothric, but the Prince decided not to fulfill his destiny and retreated to a place where none would find him, eventually prompting three of the other four Lords to abandon their thrones as well, hence why the bells have been rung and why we were called to seek them."

"Okay, so our quest involves hunting down the three missing Lords of Cinder, while hoping to find a way to locate the missing Prince and drag him back here," Tirek said, showing Sarana that he understood what she had told him and that he had an idea of what they needed to do once they left the shrine, even though it didn't look like there were any paths that would take them over to the castle that they had seen when they rested at the first bonfire, "though I don't see how we're supposed to get to the walled city from here, since I didn't see any paths leading over to it... not unless there's a secret path or something inside the shrine that I don't know about."

"I think the Fire Keeper mentioned something about presenting the coiled sword to the bonfire, but other than that I have no idea where to go." Sarana admitted, showing that she did know something that might help them out, while also having no real idea on where they were supposed to go from here, before glancing at the rest of the people that happened to be inside the shrine for a few seconds, "Maybe we should talk to the others and see if they have anything to tell us, before we try putting the coiled sword in the bonfire."

Tirek decided that he might as well follow her lead, since she knew the land and its rules better than he did, and the first person they approached was the rather depressed looking knight that moaned about his existence and the fact that they, as the Unkindled, weren't fit to seek the Lords of Cinder or even lick their boots, informing Tirek that he must have hated his life and hated his second life even more. In that moment Tirek decided that he didn't much care for the knight and it appeared that Sarana agreed with him, though potentially for different reasons, and it wasn't long before the pair found two more people down the tunnel that was near where the Fire Keeper was standing, where one was an old lady that was sitting in a chair, with some goods sitting around her, and a younger gentleman that was at the end of the tunnel, hammering away at something. The old lady, dressed in a red robe with a hood that covered a good portion of her head, seemed to be a general goods type of person and was willing to sell them whatever she had on her, provided they had the required souls to make the purchase, which neither of them had since they used their souls to empower themselves for the next area they would be heading to. The blacksmith, Andre as he called himself, was much happier to see them and informed the pair that he could take the Titanite they'll acquire during their journey, be they shards, chunks, scales, or even the incredibly rare slabs, if they could find any, and empower their weapons for the journey that was ahead of them, and also told them that he could help them with their Estus Flasks, something that Sarana would tell Tirek about if they found something to do that.

In the end Tirek and Sarana found themselves walking over to the occupied throne, where they found the small man, Ludleth of Courland to be exact, waiting for the other Lords of Cinder to be brought back to their thrones, and when they approached him, as they had to walk around to the back of where his throne was resting and then walk around the side to face him, he turned to look at them as they came to a stop.

"Oh, the two of you are Unkindled, are you not, while one of you is the Seeker of Lords." Ludleth said, where his tone revealed that he was pleased to meet them, even if his words seemed to cause the pair to tilt their heads for a moment as he spoke, before he gestured to himself, "I am Ludleth of Courland, though you likely knew that already. Do not look at me in bewilderment as I say that I once linked the Fire, a long time ago to be exact, becoming a Lord of Cinder, like those that had come before me, but you do not have to worry about me abandoning my throne, for it is as I said, I am a Lord and I know what my duty is. Tell me, Ashen One, Seeker of Lords, do you know of our purpose?"

Tirek stood there for a few seconds, wondering who the man was talking to, before Sarana elbowed him, as if she was indirectly saying that Ludleth was addressing him at the moment, even though this was the first time he had been called the 'Ashen One' since he arrived in this world, though once he considered that he straightened himself and faced Ludleth, as he might gain some answers from this.

"No. All I know is that we seek the Lords of Cinder." Tirek replied, and that was the truth, because that was all he had learned since he and Sarana had arrived in the shrine and started to talk with everyone that was here, so he was hoping that he would be able to learn more about the quest and what he needed to do, since this seemed to be the path that would allow him to regain his former powers.

"I had the feeling you might say that, so I will tell you what you need to know," Ludleth stated, where he focused his mind for a moment and thought about what it was that he wanted to say next, while at the same time Sarana did nothing as they stood there, before the man faced them once more, "Five thrones will take five Lords, who will act as kindling for the linking of the Fire, as the fast fading Flame needs such a thing to happen to preserve this world... basically, we will be re-enacting the very first time someone linked the Fire. You need to locate the other four Lords that have been chosen to sit on the other thrones, and once all five of us are present we can perform the reenactment."

Tirek was interested in what Ludleth had to say, but that appeared to be everything he wanted to talk about at the moment, so he and Sarana returned to the center of the shrine, where his companion pulled out the coiled sword they had taken from the knight that was guarding the area outside this building and returned it to the bonfire, activating it in a matter of seconds, and she proceeded to sit by it, though when Tirek did so his world went black as he was taken to an unknown area and would likely have words with his companion when they finally arrived at their destination.