Chapter 47:- Ashes of Invasion
Disclaimer:- all the characters form the game belong to moonton and this is not a commercial story but just the work of a diehard fan.
Claimer:- the other characters which are not in game of mentioned are mine
The town was in ruins, no living souls was nearby and judging by the amount of burnt rubbles that was around, it was clear that this was a rather recent event. Most probably a day ago as not the entirety of the town was a pile of ashes and was still burning.
Nana had been a wreck and Hanabi was cradling the child in her arms, trying her best to comfort her yet no words managed to soothe her sobs.
It was heart breaking but they also understood that this was not the best time for it. The destruction was recent, that meant that ones who did this must be near as well. They were right because soon after they heard someone approaching and had to hide in the bushes nearby to not get caught.
Saya slowly peered out of the bush and saw two huge blood orcs, accompanied by another figure. Distinctly female, the being had the shape of a human but had pointy ears like that of a Sai'ore.
'So these are the elves.' Saya thinks to herself, now understanding why the humans confused her with one. However, this elf had a distinct purple skin and unnatural glowing white eyes.
Upon seeing the elf, Nana was confused and breathed out lowly, "A night elf? But they mostly keep to themselves at the other side of the forest. What are they doing here in the Moon Elf territory?"
"Only one way to find out…" mutters Saya and slowly pulled out her bow from bag on Nhari's back (The one she bought in 'Roger and Ruby's' arc) and notched an arrow. Hanabi got the signal and readied her kunai as well.
-X-
Karina walked through the burned mess of the once beautiful town with little remorse. Their plan was going well so far and had covered a lot of ground. The Night Elves and the Moon Elves never did actually see eye to eye and were always at odds with each other even when the two races were practically cousins. But The Moons elves were greater in number and more advanced than them so the Night elves generally avoided conflicts with them.
But when the Abyss reached out to the Night elves for help to defeat the Moon elves, they were quick to agree. The Abyss was powerful and their numbers alone could overwhelm the elves even with their superior magic and technology. However they too had the same problem as all the other invaders who had invaded Moniya, The Magical forest. Their number would mean nothing if they couldn't even reach the elves, but that is where the Night elves came in. They knew the forest and could guide the terrible force across the kingdom. A small price to watch the Moon Elves burn for all the treachery they had did to the Night elves for all these years.
Their latest campaign over the Moon Temple Town had been an explosive success. The town defence was quickly overwhelmed and by the end of the day, the abyss conquered more of the Elven lands. Many of the town's folk were killed; a few survivors were taken prisoners. Karina had no idea why the Abyss needed them, she speculated that it might be to ransom them form King Este. However, deep down she knew the truth must be a lot more sinister.
Karina shudders, remembering how her small sister was sacrificed to the Abyss; the memory making her resent her colleagues even more.
'Calm down, Karina…' she thinks to herself, 'You have worked too hard to infiltrate the ranks of the Abyss to let your emotions mess this up. Just a bit more and you will have your revenge on the abyss.' She tells herself, promising to get her revenge on the Abyss for the wrong that was done to her.
She had a job for now and that was to check whether there were more survivors or not. She and the two orcs were sent to check that sobbing noises they heard over this area and so far, they didn't find anything.
The Two orcs that were accompanying her growled suddenly, "There is nothing here. Are you sure that you heard some noises, Shadow Blade? Or have your elven ears deceived you?" they mock her with their guttural laughter and the Night elf assassin did her best to control her emotions.
"No, we should be more careful. I am sure I heard something over here."
The Orcs didn't believe her and laughed some more. However that was cut short when an arrow was suddenly lodged in his face right between the eyes. His hulking figure fell down like a sack of potatoes on the ground and his friend followed soon after a knife met its mark in his left eye.
Another arrow was shot towards her from the bushes nearby and on instinct Karina activated her Elusiveness state.
-X-
Saya's eyes widened in shock when the arrow that she had fire literally phased past Karina's ethereal body, leaving the nightelf alive and unharmed. Her instincts flared and Karina bolted the other way as fast as she could, making Saya pale in panic, "She is going for reinforcements!"
Acting fast, Hanabi threw her ultimate move towards the fleeing assassin. Throwing her chakram in an angle, Hanabi predicted Karina's movement and caught her in the middle of her escape.
Karina was thoroughly surprised when the huge chakram hit her. Her Elusive state made her immune to all normal attacks but the nature of Hanabi's attack was anything but normal as tendrils sprouted out of the ground and bind her to that place, complete immobilizing her.
The Night-elf's power timeout and her once ethereal body became solid once more. Saya could end this by shooting an arrow at the woman without a problem, but if they were to understand what was happening, they would need a prisoner. So instead of outright killing the elf, they decided to reveal themselves and when towards the immobilized woman to incapacitate her.
Seeing the Sai'ore, the human, the cat-elf and the hoarse approaching, Karina panicked. Especially seeing the huge 'elven-woman' who was coming closer with malicious intent. In desperation, Karina lashed out and slashed at the tendrils with her dual blades, trying her best to chop through the confines that restrained her. Saya cursed upon seeing this and dashed towards the assassin before she escaped. Unfortunately, Saya was tad too late and Karina had already freed herself.
She re-entered her elusiveness state and Saya phased right through her when she tried to shove Karina to the ground. Knowing that this was the only chance that she was going to get, Karina tried another escape attempt. However, an angry Nana jumped towards her and roared, "You're not going anywhere!"
Using her powers, Nana threw a project towards Karina, who was unfazed by it. She was confident that her Elusive state would render her immune to any sort of attacks, however what she didn't count on was that the projectile Nana threw at her was in fact a small stuffed blue rabbit-cat toy. As soon as it touched her, Karina's entire body was encased in a thick film of pink smoke, making her cough violently.
The smoke cleared as quickly as it came, however Karina suddenly felt that something was off. Everything around her seemed awfully big for some reason. The assassin brought up her arms to fan away the remaining smoke and that was when she saw it. She was expecting her arm, what she saw was a soft blue furry limb with pink paws. The colour drained from her face as Karina looked down at her body and all she saw was blue fur.
"What?"
Even Saya and Hanabi stood completely aghast as they saw that the once deadly night-elf assassin was now reduced to a small blue cat-rabbit thing. "What the hell?"
Recovering from her initial shock, Karina turned the other way and tried to make a run for it but she was not used to her new body and had to hop pitifully to get away as further as she could.
Nana casually walked up to the now transformed Karina and lifted her up casually as if she was her pet. The Cat-elf looked towards her shocked companions and smiled, "Told you I could do magic too!"
-X-
It took quite a while for Hanabi and Saya to finally digest that their small, sweet and cute friend Nana was in fact a very capable mage. It's as people say, you can't judge a book by its cover.
Pushing those thoughts aside for now, they all focused at the current situation at hand. The group now circled the transformed Night-elf, much to Karina's dismay and looked at her with piercing gaze.
"I am sure you know the drill, Assassin. Answer our questions and we might just let you live." Saya says coldly, her demeanour changing drastically, surprising Nana who had yet to witness how imposing Saya's character change could be.
Karina gulped as she involuntarily shuddered under the Sai'ore's gaze. She had no idea why it was so but this woman really gave her the chills. Plus Karina had noticed her eyes with slit pupils and her unnaturally long canines. She had a feeling that the woman before her was not an Elf and frankly, it made her stomach churn in a bad way.
Luckily, Nana suddenly hugged Karina's small squishy body and spoke out, "Hey, no need to be a mean!" unknowingly squashing Karina against herself and nearly squeezing the life out of her. "I am sure she will answer if you ask nicely!"
Saya sighed at the child's characteristically childish request but still decided to humour her anyways. Turning towards Karina once more, she asked nicely, "Now tell me all that has happened here. Or do you want to get squashed again." She whispered the last part lowly so that only Karina would hear.
The assassin turned cat-rabbit paled at the thought of being squashed by the child and answered hurriedly, "About week ago, The Abyss formed an alliance with the Night Elves of the Magical forest. This town was merely but another score in the conquest of the Abyssal horde."
The company frowned at this and asked, "Why would the abyss do this? Just the few months ago their siege on Mossenia was toppled."
"I don't know." Answered Karina truthfully, "I am just a soldier."
Saya rubbed her forehead at this. The very reason why she had decided to bring Hanabi to the kingdom of Moniya was so that they could get some break from the chaos and wars of the human empire but as luck would have it, they walked right into yet another civil war and there was no doubt that they will be getting involved in it as well.
Hanabi seemed to have her own doubts and initiated her own interrogation, "Why hasn't the elf king sent forces to secure the conquered areas?"
Posing a good question, the group looked at Karina expectantly and she answered nervously, "The Abyss were very thorough on not letting any news go out of the captured settlements. The Elven towns and cities are scattered and rarely communicated with each other, we used it to our advantage."
Her answer caused Hanabi to ball her fist in anger and Nana to get sad. While Saya was simply impressed by the calculative measures the Abyss took. The Technology in Land of Dawn was not developed enough to have fast reliable means of communications over great distances. What the abyss did was basically isolating the kingdom within its own wall and picking it apart piece by piece. A brutal but effective strategy, something she was very well accustomed to.
"What about the survivors? Are they still alive?" Nana asked softly, her voice small and almost broken. It made Saya and Hanabi sorry for the child, especially Karina. The small child reminded her of her long lost sister and that alone was enough to make her sympathize with Nana.
Letting out a sigh, Karina spoke, "They have rounded up all the survivors at the town square. They are currently being loaded to be sent to the Abyssal keep for who know what atrocities. Stop them if you can."
Nana perked up in joy at this and looked towards Saya and Hanabi with eyes full of hope.
"Did you hear her? We can still save them!" she squeaks excitedly, almost jumping.
Saya however frowned. It was clear she did not trust the words of the assassin and was quite concerned that Karina might be leading them to a trap. When she voiced her concerns to them, Hanabi simply shrugged. "It mostly likely is a trap. But those people need our help and if you have taught me anything, it's that 'you don't back down form helping people'." She declares boldly and Nana looks at her with awe and admiration.
The Ancient Sai'ore let out a breath. She should have known that her human would be more than willing to come forth to help those in need and frankly, she couldn't help but respect and adore her virtuous nature. Smiling softly, she simply say, "Fine. Just please don't kill yourself."….
(Chapter 47 done. We really have come very far my dear readers. Merry Christmas to you all and may the new year be far better than the one we had)