DISCLAIMER: I don't own Fire Emblem, Fire Emblem and its characters belongs to Nintendo.
"Thoron!"
The shout of the spell echoed through the halls of the Risen plagued mansion.
"Rhaaagh!" The monster cried out as the beam of lightning pierced it's chest.
Today the Shepherds were on a rescue mission after they caught the wind of a rumor.
It was said that a young woman wander into the cursed mansion.
The mansion was cursed to be an inescapable labyrinth, anyone who wander in, would never wander out again.
The curse has been proven to be the least of their concern, as they quickly prepared themselves to head in and help this unfortunate maiden.
"Hah…hah…" The ragged breath belonged to the young spell caster and royal tactician of the Shepherds himself, Robin.
The basic of his plan was to quickly move in, and rescue the young woman as fast as they could, unfortunately this proven to be a much harder task to carry out.
The curse of the mansion has proven to be a really hinder in the Shepherds their progress, with walls appearing and disappearing at random intervals, it was nothing but a very difficult task.
At least first part of the plan was reached, finding the young woman, Nah was her name.
"Are you alright?" Her petite voice reminded Robin of his surrounding, a very particular situation.
"I'm doing alright.., but we must move out of here fast, I can't keep at bay by myself."
Nah sighed, if only they didn't get separated with the rest of the Shepherds.
After the Shepherds headed into the mansion, they found themselves encountering Risen behind every corner, battle was proven to difficult, flying units had restricted space to fight in, mages firing spells at each other, the rest of the ground units were at risk of getting caught in the crossfire.
The only option left was to split up and regroup later after defeating most of the Risen.
With the walls collapsing and rebuilding, it scattered the Shepherds even more, splitting then into tiny groups through the whole mansion.
After wandering the mansion by himself, Robin found the woman they came looking for, she herself was miraculously unharmed despite the Risen wandering around.
"Do you have any idea where we are wandering off to?" She asked him, they have been wandering around for quite a while now, no sign of the Shepherds or even Risen.
It has been bothering Nah for a while now.
"No, but it's better to be on the move, that way it's harder for the Risen to corner us." He replied coolly.
Despite his response, Robin pondered the same question inside his mind, imagining different scenarios, maybe the Shepherds killed all of the Risen?
Maybe they escaped? At least Robin knew it couldn't be that the Risen killed the Shepherds, they are capable enough to handle the Risen even without his constant directions.
Nah fidgeted, she felt bad about having the Shepherds coming to rescue her, if only she didn't enter the mansion to shelter herself from the raging storm that occurred 2 days ago…
"Dammit!" Nah cursed the sky for allowing such a nasty storm to rain down on the people below it.
She held her coat above her, shielding her poorly from the storm. She has been running for a while now, searching for a suitable shelter, quite hard mind you, the rain was coming down so hard it was obscuring her sight and pelting her with surprisingly big raindrops.
She stopped for a second, glazing up the hill was a mansion. "There!" She sped of towards the mansion hoping to find shelter there.
She knocked on the door "Hello? Can I come in please?" No response, fortunately there was overhang, but with being drenched, she needed a warm place to keep herself from freezing to death.
"Hello! Is there anyone?!" She tried calling out anyone within the mansion.
The right front door opened itself with a creaky sound, Nah jumped, letting out a small yelp.
"Ah?! Hah…hah.., t-that was just the d-door, nothing to be scared o-off."
She let out a shaky sigh, slightly ashamed of herself getting scared of a creaky door.
She hesitated, storm plus creepy, probably abandoned mansion plus lonesome girls equaled trouble.
A lot of horror stories she heard about started similar to this, and it creeped Nah out even more.
"Heh heh, no need to be scared.., it's just an abandoned mansion.., meaning no one dangerous can be inside right? You know what, I'll just stay here, I'm going to be fine just staying here!"
The storm didn't seem to agree with her last statement, as it released a loud boom, it startled Nah even more than she already was.
"Fine, fine! I'm going in! There is no need to start threatening me like that!"
She took a moment to calm her heart with slow and deep breaths.
Slowly she pushed the door opening it.
"I'm coming in! I hope you don't mind!" She yelled despite not receiving a reaction on her previous callouts.
Nah sighed to herself, had she not wandered in, none of this would have happened in the first place.
"Are you alright Nah?" She jumped at hearing her name. "Wah w-what?!"
"Calm down.., I've been noticing that you have been spacing out a lot."
She blushed, she probably made a fool out of herself. "I-I'm alright…"
"…that doesn't sound very convincing.., especially with you spacing out. You aren't sick or anything, right?" Robin closed in on her, kneeling slightly to look at her face.
Her blushing intensified with him so close up in her face. "A-Aah!" She took a few steps back, burying her face in her hands to hid her blush.
"Oh, I apologize for surprising you like that..," Robin straightened himself, blushing a little bit himself.
"Nonono, I-it isn't your fault! Y-yyou just wanted to check upon me, which is perfectly fine! Hehehe…"
They stood there for a couple of minutes, an awkward silence resided between them.
"W-we should get back to searching for the rest of the Shepherds…" He half whispered, careful not to disturb the silence.
Nah followed up with a silent "Yes." And followed him again.
Not a few moments later there was a growl alerted the tactician and his company of approaching danger.
"Oh no…" Behind them a Risen swordsman turned the corner, it stopped a moment before violently growling in their direction.
Robin swore under his breath, he was hoping not to have another encounter with these freaks of nature.
He quickly unsheathed his Levin Sword, the blade glowed and started sparking as Robin released some of his magic into it.
Risen saw this as a treat as it unsheathed it's own sword, a silver one and lurched forward to meet Robin in a dual.
Robin dashed forward as well, both swordsman clashed their blades together. Struggling to gain the advantage, both jumped back to readjust themselves.
The they threw themselves at each other again. They couldn't land a single hit, their blades clashed, parried or simply missed due to dodging.
"For some undead corpse, you're not a bad swordsman." They jumped back again. After a little stare down, the zombie gave a series of slight growls almost if it was complimenting Robin back.
Nah could only stand and watch, these creatures terrified her to no end. Plus it would be bad consent of her to intervene on such a two sided battle.
"Let's see how you fare against this!" Robin flicked his sword then performed a diagonal upwards, firing a small lightning bolt towards his undead opponent.
The Risen quickly stepped out of the way, deciding that it had enough of Robin, the beast lurched forwards again, falling for Robin's trap.
As soon as the Risen had Robin within it's striking range, it raised it's sword with the intention of impelling Robin trough his chest.
Robin anticipated it and quickly clashed his Levin Sword on the side of the Silver one, Robin's opponent had no chance to react to his next move.
Robin quickly flicked his wrist, unbalancing the sword hand of the dead swordsman, and stabbing him trough his chest.
"Braaaargh!" The Risen cried out as it sank to its knees and then met the floor with the rest of its body.
"I-is it dead..?" Nah's shaky voice spoke. "I-I think so..," he let out a sigh. "That's the end of him." He resheathed his sword. "Come on, I really don't want to deal with these creatures anymore."
Deep murmurs echoed through the halls behind the fallen Risen.
Both of them turned around, the murmurs were progressively louder.
Robin turned to Nah "Run!" "Behind you!"
The Risen swordsman that Robin 'killed' jumped back up, Robin turned around quick enough to escape a fatal blow, but didn't evade the slash completely.
"Aargh!" He screamed in pain as the Silver Sword made a deep cut into his chest.
"Robin!" She yelled. Robin stumbled a few steps before losing his balance, ungracefully falling to the ground. Nah's eyes widened, "Robin couldn't die like that, right..?"
She took a few steps back before tumbling backwards onto her behind. Blood was spreading around Robin.
"N-no.., nnn-no..," her pupils were dilated, shaking. The scene in front of her brought back memories she hoped never returned to her...
The scene in front of her flickered between realty and her memory.
"Where are we going daddy?" A child's voice spoke. "Away from those monsters…"
Two figures moved through the burning forest, the howls of those monsters ringing in their ears.
These times were dangerous, walking somewhere unsecured could mean death. Especially if you run into a pack of Risen. Moving trough a forest seemed the best course of action, hoping the would lose track of you...
Moving into a clearing, a Risen Dark Knight suddenly jumped out the thick bush in front of them, the horse of the knight pranced, releasing a shriek only heard in the deepest lands of hell.
Standing in the path, the male and his daughter were stopped dead in their track. He quickly put his daughter down, taking a few steps forward to attract the attention of the Risen infront of him.
The Risen held up his hand, his hand emanated a dark red aura, in his other hand it held a Bolgonone tome.
The male grabbed his own tome out of his robe, a light blue cover.
"You're not gonna move are ya?"
The Dark Knight grunted and released the dark aura, forming a magic circle under need the male.
Jumping back before the geyser of lava could hit him, he opened his tome and rose his hand towards the Dark Knight.
"Rexcalibur!"
A large swirl made of wind magic released itself from underneath the Risen.
The Risen roared as the spell tore it apart, the spell was more vicious, laced with the hatred for these creatures.
Both rider and stead were flung away, out of his path.
"Now let's go before they cat-RAHG!" Before the male could pick up his daughter, a Short Axe embedded itself in his shoulder.
"DADDY!" The girl cried out.
The male slumped to his knees, holding his shoulder in pain. "...Run.." He spoke through clenched teeth.
"B-but Dad-" "NO, please run! You could still make it to the others!" "I-I don't want to leave you behind..."
"Please run.., you need to survive..," "...Dad..." The girl was crying by now. She had to help her father but he told her to run, it was conflicting...
She took a few steps backwards when she saw a Risen warrior walking towards the injured man.
"A-AAGH!" The Risen warrior had no remorse as it roughly pulled the axe out of the male's shoulder.
She sat there, frightened, shocked, speechless. Her quivering mouth mumbled incomprehensible words.
"...r...r-run...please..." he whispered. Deciding that the injured man spoke enough, the warrior rose his axe into the air and brought it down with a loud grunt, planting the axe firmly into the male's back.
Crimson blood splattered everywhere, time before the girl seemed to slow down, every drop of blood coloring then grass red.
"...No...d-daddy..." a deadly silence fell over the clearing,
"DADDYYY!" Her voice echoed through the entire forest, "...Why.., why..?" Her voice quivered.
Her loud sobbing quickly carried over in uncontrollable crying.
The Risen warrior pulled his axe out of the mans back, the entire edge besmirched with blood and small fleshy pieces of what was probably left of his lungs.
The Risen stumbled over towards the girl, noticing the Risen the girl crawled back until her back hit a tree behind her.
"...N-no..."
The Risen stopped a inches from her, slowly raising its axe...
"...P-please...don't..."
Her body was shaking uncontrollably, terrified beyond reasons...
The moon created a dark silhouette of the Risen, the blood on the axe shining in its light, it crimson eyes completely focused on the girl, filled with murderous intent...
This was it... she was going to die by the hand of this beast... No one was going to save her... No one to comfort her trough the last minutes of her life...
The beast gave one last loud growl before bring in his axe down on the girl... One last word echoed trough the clearing...
"Thoron!"
End of part 1
Want more? Make sure to show your support by: Leaving a review, following and sharing the story.
Constructive criticism is always welcome.