Chapter 1: Prologue
Acrid smoke filled the air, as the lamentations of hundreds echoed. They cursed and screamed, begged and pleaded, their voices rising in crescendo before falling silent.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
The dark world was bathed in purifying light and for a single moment not a single shadow existed in this false world.
A single woman lay panting on the ground, clawing at it as she struggled to drag her battered body away from the destruction. Each movement was agonizing as jagged rocks ripped and pierced her once delicate skin. Her once regal dress was in tatters, a few scraps hanging off her voluptuous frame failing to cover her modesty. The long and luscious brown hair that had been the envy of many a woman as well as the fantasy of many men was clumped and roughly cut possessing none of the splendor it had been known for.
But she didn't care, ignoring the agony of her wounds as she crawled towards her attacker. Every second she lived was a second closer to freedom and every inch moved an insult to the one who had harmed her so grievously.
Vengeance and pure willpower drove her, empowering her battered body, she would LIVE! Her home, her family were all being threatened by this…this demon, and here she was powerless to stop it.
The screaming grew louder with each foot she crawled, the stench of burning flesh overpowering her heightened senses. Every instinct in her cried out for her to flee, to find the deepest and blackest hole that she could in an attempt to bury what had happened here today. But she would not.
After what seemed like hours she finally came upon her ruined home its stately grandeur ruined. The attack had come without warning and they had been unprepared for the ferocity of it, and it had taken everything she had just to buy her people enough time to take shelter. Still her body may be weary and broken, her home in shambles but to her it did not matter as both could be rebuilt. The lives of those who had entrusted themselves to her and their families were more important than anything else. At the ruined foyer she managed to find a staff sturdy enough to support her frail stature, and she managed to stand on shaky legs.
Hobbling through her home, flashes of happier times played through her mind. Playing with both her sister and her daughter and niece, memories of her parents and growing up, the parties she had held, all of it torn asunder. She stumbled and fell her hands slick with blood and gore as she came face to face with the perverse visage of her seneschal. She had known the man since her birth, and he had helped raise her and later acted as her advisor, to her he was more than a servant but a pseudo-uncle. Now though his features were twisted in horror and pain, his mouth forever open as he silently screamed, his once twinkling blue eyes now nothing more than hollow expanses where they had been burned out.
She fought the urge to vomit as she saw his body lying on the other side of the hall, along with dozens of others, their skin blackened and charred, limbs vaporized and some leaving no trace of their existence except for the memories she held and a pile of ash where they had stood their ground.
You'll be avenged. She thought wiping away her tears. She pushed herself back to her feet, the staff finally giving out and snapping, sending her back to the ground.
"AHHH-" She heard a scream suddenly interrupted as an intense pressure bore down on her. The sound spurred her on and she stumbled back up and using the wall as crutch made her way towards the heart of the manor. More screams, each one growing more and more desperate as she approached the most well defended part of her home, and also the area that served as a shelter for the families under her protection.
The entire layout of the manor had been designed to give attackers difficulties in advancing while bolstering defenders, as well as being maze like to herd them to killzones. These all failed as the demon cleaved its way through anything that stood in its path. Following it had been child's play but how she wished she didn't, as the overwhelming presence drove her to her knees.
Turning the corner she found the one that had wounded her so and killed all her men. A silver Demon loomed in front of her, its entire body encased in steel in the form of a Knight.
From the sabatons protecting his feet to the visored barbute with decorative swept back wings on either side, the armor screamed majesty. On the Demon's back was what was once an immaculate white cape reaching his knees, only now the fringe was in tatters and soaked in blood. In his left hand was a blazing tear dropped shape tower shield of white light, while in his right he brandished a wicked looking halberd.
As if sensing her gaze the Demon turned to her, releasing its weapons allowing them to dissipate into the particles that they were formed from.
Demon and Woman stared at one another for a long second before the demon dismissed her as insignificant, and turned its back on her. Screaming in outrage she let loose, a blue magic circle materializing in front of her and shooting forth a dozen spears of ice.
The Demon didn't care, the constructs simply disappearing the moment that they touched him. Before she could cast another attack a steel fist met her stomach, as she stared at the space in front of her wide eyed. I didn't even see him move. Her mind stammered before the pain hit her and she was lifted off her feet to collide with the ceiling.
Before she could fall back down she felt a force seize her limbs, and she saw the Demon with his hand outstretched as if grasping her body. With a negligent flick of its wrist it sent her hurtling into the walls of the room,
Her cries of pain and agony reverberated in the narrow corridors. What is he doing? She thought, only to realize what it was planning. They were in front of the shelter that protected her family and the family of her retainers, and he was preying on any sympathy/loyalty that they might have for her. He was unable to breach the barrier that protected them, so the only thing he could do was force them to open the door and let him in.
Knowing this she tried to stifle her screams, but to no avail. The demon took her limp body and smashed it against the barrier protecting the shelter, her face against the magic seal. Those on the inside could only watch in horror as the demon took their Lady's head in one massive plated gauntlet and begin to slowly crush it.
That was the final straw as the last of the soldiers activated the defenses on the door, casting a large concussion spell that sent both their lady and the Demon flying to opposite sides of the room.
The doors opened and the soldiers sallied forth in an attempt to grab their Lady and bring her into the protections of the shelter. "NO! YOU FOOLS!"
Only for their play to fail in the first few seconds.
The Demon recovered quicker than they thought possible and holding his hand out a cone of white light erupted from his palm. "Thank you." The demon said softly, its voice light and lyrical, sweet like the finest honey. The air was awash with screaming then an ominous silence.
A symphony of Destruction in which he was the maestro.
Where once there were a dozen soldiers bravely marching to rescue her there were now a dozen piles of ash, the light reducing them into piles finer than grains of sand. The fine armor that she had given them befitting their station as effective as issue paper against the cleansing power of the attack.
Crying out in anguish she let loose with the remaining reserves of her power, summoning forth spears of ice, torrents of water to try and drown him and razor sharp whips.
All failed.
The Demon stood there stoically taking the attacks, never moving an inch. Every attack she cast did not so much fail to penetrate his defenses as simply wink out of existence.
Collapsing in exhaustion, it was only then that the Demon decided to move as it took a step towards her. "SISTER!" a voice cried out and both turned to see a young woman, dressed in a nightgown charging from the doorway brandishing a crude spear of ice.
"Alia NO!" The exhausted woman cried out seeing her sister trying to attack the Demon. If her powerful magics were unable to pierce the defenses of this demonic knight then what hope did a woman with an already weakened body wielding a crude spear have?
As if in answer to her question the crude spear shattered as soon as it touched the armor, and an armored hand shot forth and grasped Alia by the throat, lifting her a foot off the ground as the armored being stared at her.
With its free hand it pointed its palm towards the shelter, and both sisters gasped as they saw the faces staring at them. Faces both young and old, many of whom they had grown up with and who had entrusted themselves to the pair. Alia desperately tried to escape, to cast something to protect them, as her exhausted sister begged and pleaded with the Demon, promising anything and everything so long as her people were spared.
It was a futile effort as everyone felt the power gathering in his palm, and even bodily throwing herself at the arm could not divert his aim. The two sisters turned, mouthing apologies to their people only to see their hollow eyes judging, damning them for their failures, and in a flash of Light they were nothing more than shadows on the walls.
The sisters cried as they felt the weight of their failings, before the Demon turned its attention back to them. Its grip tightened and Alia found herself unable to breath, her hand beating futilely against its armored chest and bracers. Her sister attempted to tackled the armored demon only to be kicked away, the steel sabaton crashing into her face with a sickening crunch.
She could only watch through teary eyes as the final moment of her sister's life played out. The Demon raised its hand and placed it on her sister's forehead.
"I love you." Alia said, her eyes rolled back as she issued a banshee like wail before her entire body crumbled into ash.
The demon trampled over her remains, uncaring about the fact that it had been a living being only a minute ago.
"Why?" She asked, her mind broken from the shock of all that happened. The Demon was silent as she pressed it for answers. "She had nothing to do with the War. She was innocent in this."
In response the Demon pulled out a well-used Rosario of silver and gold.
"That's what this is about!" The exhausted woman cried out. "I have lost more than you have! My friends killed, our homes ravaged and destroyed! The very air poisoned, the ground burning anyone that stepped foot there. Now you stand here, over the bodies of my family any you dare to justify your actions because of the fact that you lost your-"
Anything else she might've said was cut off as the Demon raised its right hand and shot forth a blast of Light, vaporizing the upper half of her body.
As if mockingly a voice whispered in the back of his mind. She will never love you. Not after how far you've Fallen.
"BE SILENT!" He commanded, his control slipping for a moment, vaporizing the rest of the woman before him. No longer was his voice like sweet honey, but raw, powerful and unyielding. Every word he said was a promise and was imbued with the solemn authority of Divine Kingship.
Shaking his head, he raised his hand and solemnly he intoned, "The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee."
As he spoke a shimmering distortion formed in the air, as the hilt of a sword began to slowly poke out. Grasping it with two hands he withdrew it from its special vault. The entire world was bathed in light and majesty, as all who looked at the blade could not help but stare at its magnificence. This was not a weapon forged by mortal hands but willed into existence by the Divine himself, imbued with a portion of himself, and created during the darkest days of the War. It was a weapon made with the singular purpose of smiting his foes. If Excalibur was a Sword of Man this was a Sword of God, the crystallization of the Prayer of Domination, the dream of a God who sought to protect his children from the horrors of the Dark. So long as it existed so did the Dream that it represented and so to would he be here to carry out the will of his Lord.
Taking the blade in his hands he said, "EVERYONE WHO CALLS ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED!" Then he plunged the blade into the ground. "KYRIE ELEISON!"
A pillar of light erupted from him sundering the heavens and destroying everything around him, as its divine might rapidly expanded to the outlying countryside.
Nothing it touched survived and when it faded all that was left was a single Demon clad in steel kneeling on the ground with a sword stabbed into the ground. The entire region had been purified of the filth, and yet he was still no closer to hearing the voice of his Lord once more. Unseen tears flowed from behind its armored visage as it cried out. When silence answered him, the demon pulled the sword out of the ground and dismissed it back into its vault and began to leave.
She watched as the demon left her ruined home, had seen as it killed her family, and then disappeared. Numbly she crawled out of the small shelter that her mother had sent her to, separate from the ones that the others had gone to. Almost immediately she cried out in pain as the searing hot sand burned her hands and knees. Stubbornly she carried on, desperate to find some proof of her family, her young mind unable to fully process the devastation she had seen wrought. The closer she got to the epicenter the harder she found it to breathe, the aftereffects of the attack slowly transforming the area turning it into a poisonous badlands for her kind.
Frantically she searched through the ruins looking for something…anything that was her family's. Her hands dug through the ashes of the remains, until her hand brushed something cold and metallic.
Crying out in triumph she dug faster, her small hands combing through the ash to reveal a small locket. Tears poured from her eyes as she stumbled with the latch, the sight of her mother and aunt greeting her when she got it open.
Clutching it to her chest she held onto it like a life preserver, to her it was all that remained of her proud family.
Getting up on shaky legs she tried to figure out what to do now, only for all her plans to come to a screeching halt, as pain unlike any she had felt in her few years struck her in the chest. Numbly she looked down to see a cruciform shape impaled in her pubescent body. Unable to truly understand what was going on she touched the object, wondering exactly how it got there. Looking up her eyes grew wide in horror as the Silver Demon loomed in front of her, slowly materializing as if it had been standing there cloaked the entire time. In its hand it clutched a long and slender rapier like sword with an extremely short hilt that was dyed red the same as its crossguard. Demon and child stared at one another for several seconds, before the demon rammed the remaining meter of the blade's length through her body, and twisted.
A wail that could put a banshee's to shame erupted from her mouth as the demon let go of the blade and she fell to her knees desperately trying to remove it. However she was unable to as the poisonous aura began to invade her body slowly and painfully killing her. It watched her, its stoic silence a foil to her loud wailing.
Kneeling down it picked up the locket of her family and gently pried it open, staring at the picture. Then with a burst of cruel power the locket disintegrated in front of her very eyes, before the demon stood up and turned its back and began to walk away, the billowing white cloak fluttering in the wind. With every step it took it body gradually disappeared until it was nothing more than the slightest shimmer.
Crying, refusing to accept her fate as her hand touched the ashes of the locket for the briefest moment before it was blown away.
And so it was that the child, Katerea Leviathan, last descendent of Leviathan, was left to die on the ashes of all that she had loved.