I
Hasan knew better.
He knew better than to sneak out and run off into the streets. Knew better than to follow the pair of tax collectors who took what little coin his mother earned throughout the week. He knew he'd risked life and limb doing so, just like those who dared fill their pitchers beyond the weekly ration. Just like his father.
Yes, Hasan knew better, but he did not care, not anymore. Enough was enough. He already had plenty of practice stealing food from the market without anyone noticing, this was no different.
The two armed and armored tax collectors, sat in a small stall near the shadowed alleyway where he stood, joyful in their afternoon break. Their black breastplates and blades bore the mark of a jewel. The symbol of Haqir the XIII, ruler of Jawhara. The grand oasis city of the Zuagir desert. Oblivious to his presence, the men talked about the joy of their profession as they stuffed their faces full of wine and mutton. Which they of course did not pay for and complained about the quality of said meal with the proprietor of the run-down establishment.
Hasan reached inside his worn shirt and grasped his necklace, a gift from an kind, elderly fortune teller. An ebon figurine carved in the likeness of a man, one he held onto whenever he found himself in need of solace or a boost of confidence, such as right before attempting a life-risking act.
He took a breath as he analyzed the distance between him and the unknowing pair. Even with the shadows lent to him by the barrel of dusty grain by his side, and the noise of the bustling street nearby, it would be dangerous, deadly even. A myriad of thoughts ran through his head but in the end, one stood true.
He did not care. He had to do it. No, he wanted to.
In a swift movement, he snatched both the men's clinking pouches, put them inside the pockets of his ragged leather trousers, and took off as fast as he could. Soon he heard unsheathed blades, clanging steps, and loud shouts coming from not far behind, but he did not dare to turn back. Each step through the twisting alleyways made his heart hammer. Each sharp-footed turn made his stomach sink, and every last-moment jump over the many dried canals made him feel the overbearing sensation of doom breathing down his neck. That is until, to his surprise, the sounds of chase diverted and faded away.
He looked back and saw no one there. However, something forced him to scrutinize, to shift his gaze back and forth toward every street and shadow. The moment stretched into eternity and with every blink and every breath, memories of many a cautionary tale began to creep in.
Stories of criminals, born of necessity or otherwise, losing their heads after thinking themselves safe from the pursuit of Haqir's men. Some, people swore, cleaved in two by a blow that came from nowhere, for death lurked around every bazaar and corner to those that dared defy Haqir's men, Haqir's order. A terrible sense of regret and danger flooded over him. The dark contour of the clay and brick buildings no longer made him feel safe and hidden, as they had many times before when stealing bread or pitchers of water. They made him feel trapped, watched.
He gripped his ebon necklace and as he walked backward in complete silence, eyeing his surroundings as if a fly hovering inches away from the web, he began to repeat an inner mantra: There was no one there with him, no soldiers, no death dwelling in the umbra. He was safe. There was no one there with him.
Soon after, he bumped into something solid and fell face-first to the floor. Fueled by terror, he turned around, but before he was about to leap aside and run off to wherever his frightened steps could take him, he stopped, frozen in a mixture of fear and awe. His eyes went wide with surprise, for before him stood not one of Haqir's men, but the imposing, looming figure of a stranger.
The unfamiliar man wore but a pair of trousers and sandals, which were as if a loincloth and shreds, due to their haggard state. However, although he was just as worn-down as his garments, sun-beaten and with hunger clear in his sunken cheeks, there was, nevertheless, undeniable strength and willpower to his person. Cord-like muscles composed his powerful shape, a wild sand-covered black mane covered his head, and beneath those long locks were piercing blue eyes. An azure pair that told unspoken tales of hardship and high adventure.
Hasan had heard tales of the Cimmerians before—northern barbarians of unmatched ferocity, as told by weary travelers at the heavily regulated taverns of the city. Warriors of the untamed wilds born and raised in the harsh wastelands, home of flesh-rending beasts and bone-chilling weather, a place where only the fittest survive, and where the mastery of steel is as paramount as the air.
Never did he believe he would ever see one in the flesh. Neither did he expect one to lend him a hand in aid, take it back with a mischievous smile, and point at his protruding, clinking pockets.
Hasan blinked, frowned, and shook his head, to which the Cimmerian responded with a nod and a long, deep breath, the tall-tale signs of an ululating cry. He muttered something unbecoming of his young age and tossed one of the bags of coin at the barbarian's open palm.
The Cimmerian, catching the bag with much mirth, shot him a satisfied smirk and walked off in the direction towards the busy streets of the market. As Hasan saw him disappear from sight—with half of his rightfully stolen coin—he could not help but feel—some—admiration towards the mysterious stranger.
Begrudging to be sure, but admiration nonetheless.
II
Conan knew better.
He knew better than to flaunt his—now-former—wealth and tales of sorcerous-tower-climbing bravado at seedy bars—while also ignoring the scathing, foreboding glares of the clientele, knew better than to woo the daughter of a notorious, irate merchant, and quite well understood not to follow lulling, spellbound voices inside his head. More so when they promised him wine, riches, and glory in times of need.
Sure, it was not as if he had much of an option, to begin with, considering he had been left nigh naked by a group of opportunistic brigands as he lay asleep and exhausted on the moonlit sands. Never again would he bed the daughter of an irate merchant in the man's own living quarters, less so if the man had a retinue of a hundred fighting-ready men, waiting to ambush and chase him out into the desert at a moment's notice.
So yes, he had little choice but to follow the voice's promises and directions towards the city of Jawhara, in the hopes of quenching his parched throat, fill his rumbling belly and—with some measure of good fortune—obtain treasures beyond his imagination. Things were far from what the voice had promised him, however. In fact, the presence ceased to speak the moment he took his first steps in the imposing metropolis—after dropping off from an unassuming caravan amidst its, rather intensive, checkup at the gates.
For one thing, the city, though grand—as he had heard of in many a tavern during his many travels—showed no signs of its notorious prosperity, beyond the presence of its military might and its admittedly imposing size and skyline, nor of its famed oasis, save for a few pathetic trickles that passed off as canals. He could have cared less, of course, if it weren't for the atrocious quality, and meager amounts, of moldy bread and stagnant water he managed to swipe from the many run-down stalls spread about the market area.
Things were looking grim to say the least. That was until fortune graced him with a child in need—one chased around by a reasonable amount of armed men, given his lack of weapons—as well as a most weighty coin pouch to demand, as due reward for distraction.
It was not as if he cared about the locals, but he was not going to steal from those he knew had only copper in store. Better to take from the upper echelons, and better yet if someone else had already done the dirty work for him.
He chuckled and gave the bag a light shake, feeling the shifting, clinking riches inside. He stopped a few steps before entering the loud alleyway market and peeked at its contents, smiling wide in anticipation. He sighed.
There was not a shred of silver.
Had the voice been ironic? Were the promises of wine and riches paltry water skins and dirty copper coins? Was there glory to be found aiding a young thief by distracting the soldiers who sought after the boy?
Miffed to no end, he stormed into the busy streets and snatched another piece of stale bread from one of the rickety stalls. No one noticed this of course—save for his clear disgust—and neither did anyone notice his mutterings: a rather lengthy curse directed at mischievous sorcerers with far too much free time on their hands, those bored with the world, lulling poor, desperate souls into unfortunate situations for the sake of their own amusement.
At least this will be enough to drown my sorrows. He bit onto another piece of bread, albeit with hesitance. Crom knows I cannot leave this downtrodden pit without washing them all away, lest I want the memories of my misfortune to torment me while I wake or slumber —
Ever ready for combat, the days of blistering heat, hunger, and eternal trudging did little to dull his instincts, honed to near-perfection after a childhood growing up in the cold, unforgiving wastes of the northern lands. In a flurry of movement, he ducked and rolled out of harm's way, evading the strike of a two-handed blade that would have lopped off his head, right in the nick of time. He then regained his footing and, in no more than a split-second, measured his opponent and took in his surroundings.
Where there had only been people going about their day-to-day, now soldiers flooded in, from every nearby corner and stall of the crowded alleyway market. Soldiers, dozens over dozens of the black-armored enforcers of the city. Danger was afoot, but somehow he knew this went beyond the presence of mere foes of flesh and steel, for he saw it in their eyes. Saw how they burned with of an unnatural shade of scarlet, an emanation vile energy, which, thanks to his worldly experience, he could tell was but the tendril of a greater, ignoble being.
Conan sprang into action.
Using his mighty strength, he reached for the meager stall of a poor baker and flung it at the soldier in front of him. The makeshift projectile crashed into the man, tossing him to the floor, covered in planks and shards of broken vases that once contained stale muffins and loaves of moldy bread. He knew the makeshift barricade could only slow down the swarm of soldiers behind him for so long, and he was not about to let such an advantage go to waste.
He went into a full sprint, shoving, pushing and flinging merchants and merchandise alike, all the while dodging blades and pikes as he sped through the decrepit corridor of commerce. Not long after, he made it to one of the empty streets and took a sharp turn, however, to his surprise and shock, the very same soldier he thought laying, groaning on the dirty street floor, smothered under the weight of some poor sap's livelihood, now stood in front of him, blade mid-swing, aiming at the midsection of his skull.
There was no splattering of brains, nor shattering of the cranial bone. Rather, the floor gave way beneath him, causing him to plummet into pitch-black darkness.
III
Conan opened his eyes and saw nothing. He ran his hands over his head and body, to verify that he still lived.
Nothing splattered. Nothing broken. Nothing torn. Heart still beating.
He let out a deep sigh, despite the unnatural darkness that enveloped him, for he too felt solid ground beneath his feet. Then, a glow flickered itself into existence, a speck of verdant light in the void. He felt drawn to that mysterious, glowing, disc-like apparition that appeared to float in the darkness, as a moth would to a flame. As he got closer, he soon realized that it was not a speck, but a swirling, green liquid, hovering static in midair at the height of his waist, and the more he stared the more he noticed something unnerving occur within its bubbling confines. Conjured images, pictures of his life, as if it were a window from where to witness bygone days.
It showed his earliest years as a young boy in the tundra, learning the art of the sword before he even took his first steps. He held back a feeling of sentimental longing as he saw the faces of his father and mother. Both strong, wise, and loving. He held it back, for he knew what came next, and he failed.
The image shifted and warped into pain and tragedy. He witnessed the horrifying sight without being able to take his eyes away, no matter how hard he tried. He saw his parents and his people brought down by the sword, his suffering as a slave, and his freedom as a man born of scarring hardship and endless toil. He relived the moment, as his first blood of vengeance drenched him in a shade of deep scarlet.
His hardships, his victories, all of his memories flooded him in a mystical wave of mind and soul. Until, suddenly, they stopped and a familiar voice spoke to him.
I am glad to see you well, Cimmerian.
The darkness diminished.
He blinked and looked around. He found himself in an old, dim-lit room of brick and clay, filled with trinkets, amulets, and ebon figurines, the last of which held the likeness of a man, and were identical to the necklace of the young boy he had aided not long ago. In front of him was an ancient black cauldron, which contained the bubbling liquid. Those were curiosities at best, however, compared to the small, cloaked figure that stood behind the cauldron.
The shape waved a scarred, shriveled gray hand over the liquid, moving its fingers in a similar, swirling motion.
He flinched back a step, before a sense of realization, of familiarity, forced him to stand his ground, despite the clear signs of sorcery before him.
"…You…that voice."
The cloaked figure nodded and answered, her voice brittle and weak, compared to the soft allure he had paid heed to beforehand.
"Yes, Conan of Cimmeria, it is I, the one who brought you here."
"What is it you want from me?" He shrugged. "I am no connoisseur of the dark arts. No, I abhor them, but I would be daft not to realize that it was you who also aided me to escape from those bedeviled men."
"You are correct, Cimmerian. I could not let them claim your life, for you still have a favor to fulfill."
"What sort of favor?"
"One with its due reward…"
"…I am listening."
The figure coughed after a brief moment of silence.
"Forgive me, age has dwindled my power, and veiling your presence is most taxing." She cleared her throat. "It is that precisely that reason why I sought after your aid. If I am not able to best the demon with my fading powers, then one youthful, strong, and full of guile must do so in my place. This I ask of you, Cimmerian."
"A demon, you say?"
The hand of the cloaked figure began to shift and wave with more force and effort than before, as if it dragged something ancient, distant memories not of his, a mortal of no more than a quarter of a century. Images appeared in the cauldron. It showed to him a city of grand splendor and life, one familiar and yet so different.
"By Crom! The difference is jarring. This place is not what it used to be."
"Indeed it is not. As you see, Cimmerian, Haqir's rule has brought great ruin upon the common folk of Jawhara, for hundreds and hundreds of years. Theft born of necessity is punishable by death, while the slob feeds and wallows in the innermost ring of the city, hoarding the waters of the oasis, wallowing in riches mystical and mundane, all the while he consumes the petals of the black lotus as a means to stave off his boredom."
"His lineage is truly despicable."
"No, Cimmerian, he is."
"You cannot mean that Haqir is but the first and the only?"
"Haqir was a chancellor in times of old, the right hand to the good King, Mustira, and his beloved daughter, Amira, the Princess of Jawhara. You see, Haqir always wanted more, more to life, more power. A student of the dark arts, he sought after a gem spoken about in ancient, forbidden texts. An unworldly stone of eldritch origin that would grant the user power beyond imagination and the wellspring of eternal life. And after months of toil, skullduggery, and unspeakable, soul-rending rituals, forfeiting his humanity for the sake of power, he obtained it: The Jewel of the Ages.
"After bewitching Amira with his promises of power and lust, bringing her into the world of magic under his thrall, he sought the next thing in his list, the throne. Mustira, fearing an inner war, called upon his champion, Muharib. He was the true love of the Princess, a legendary warrior of the most humble origins, who grew from stealing crumbs on the street to felling men, wizards, and demons on the battlefield with his blade. It was he who the King sent to rescue Amira and put a stop to Haqir's menace."
She paused and breathed in.
"However, during the moment of truth, as Muharib and Haqir stood atop the sorcerer's tower, clashing for the fate of Jawhara, Amira, who had fled to the safety Muharib's side, and whom the great hero shielded with his life during the battle, betrayed him, killing the man in cold blood with an arcane discharge on the back. What followed that decisive moment was due comeuppance. Haqir burned away the unassuming woman with a blast of his own as she embraced him. Without opposition, Haqir murdered the King and claimed the city of Jawhara for himself, as its usurper ruler, and its ruler he has remained and will remain unless—"
"Unless I take the Jewel from this fiend and slice him wide open," he crossed his arms. "I can well surmise the rest myself, witch."
"You must. I am but a lowly witch holding onto a thread of life spread out far too thinly across hundreds of winters. I have sought to reclaim the former glory of the city, to bring life back to its people. I preserve their legends, stories of the legendary warrior of Jawhara, a fiery will Haqir so adamantly seeks to smother." She lowered her hidden visage. "None have risen to Muharib's legacy I am afraid. All who tried now lay forgotten, as cobwebbed bones cluttering the hellish pits of the catacombs."
He crossed his arms and smirked. "Rest assured, if it is treasure that awaits me then it will be Haqir's bones instead who shall lay cobwebbed and forgotten with the rest. I mean, no offense to you legendary hero, but I do know a thing or two about the handling of evil sorcerers myself."
At that moment, he swore he saw the witch's scar-ridden mouth from beneath the heavy cloak. He saw a nostalgic smile. Was it happiness? Sorrow? Guilt? He could not say for certain, but his quandaries came to a sudden halt, for everything around him began to quake and crumble. The trinkets, amulets, and figurines fell and shattered. The cauldron shifted violently, until it toppled, spilling all of its bubbling contents over the dirt floor.
"...The ground, it shakes, but it is no earthquake!" he growled as he stared at his hand. It changed shape and size at erratic intervals. "It warps it all around it! Is this sorcery of your making?" he asked, not as a threat, but as a genuine concern.
The witch used both of her hands and weaved with trembling effort. Not a moment after, he felt the ground give away once again.
As he fell, he saw small, spectral holes opening up in an erratic manner all around the small room, puncturing wounds in space and time, from which came a ghostly light. From these crevices of reality, he saw multitudes of pairs of red, glowing eyes and the black silhouettes of armored-clad men and raised blades. Even though the inner workings of sorcery were beyond his understanding, he knew this was not the making of the witch, but the work of an external presence. The work of Haqir, he surmised, which the old crone could only hope to hold back for so long.
Then, all went black and he heard her voice for what he thought would be the last time.
I will send you as far as I can towards the Jewel, for Haqir's power stands tall over mine and prevents me from placing you further inside those deathly tunnels. It shall be your wit and your will alone that grant you victory and the glory thereafter.
Go now! Make haste! I saw your future, Conan of Cimmeria. You are to be a King. You are not to fail!
Having already experienced a magically induced drop into darkness, he flipped around in midair and fell on his feet like a powerful feline. Something crunched and cracked as he landed, but he knew these were not his joints nor his bones.
Little by little, his eyes grew accustomed to the dark. A faint, emerald glow flickered from afar, at the end of what he now saw was a tunnel of carved stone. There too was something else he noted, a ghastly sight beneath the soles of his sandaled feet.
Skulls and bones littered the floor far beyond what the eye could see. The abattoir extended well past the pitch-black horizon from both ends of the corridor, but this ghastly sight did not bother him in the slightest. He was undaunted, filled with a sentiment of adamance. Following the green light, he soon realized that it was one of the witch's amulets, laying on the floor. A cracked, glowing crystal, embedded in a circular wooden cylinder, riddled with runic carvings, its thread torn by a sharp, powerful strike. A broken necklace.
He stooped, pushing aside bones both big and small, and picked it up. He could not help but smile as he felt the familiar energy contained within. Treading in the darkness of these tunnels would have been certain death, even for him, so to send him the sorcerous equivalent of torchlight was the best the old crone could have done.
I give you my thanks. If you still live.
He then grabbed ahold of the last of his improvised equipment: a long, heavy bone, not unlike the first clubs wielded by his cave-dwelling ancestors.
Raising eldritch light in one hand and wielding a makeshift mace with the other, Conan began his search for the Jewel of the Ages.
IV
No stranger to devious dungeons and the machinations of sadistic sorcerers, Conan bested the myriad of death traps spread about the twisting corridors, many with the aid of his trusty club and the virtues of activating deadly devices from a distance with it. As for the monstrous beings roaming about, multi-legged pets of Haqir adapted to life in pitch-darkness, he merely circumvented the creatures through clever maneuvers of misdirection, such as making noise with the many bones on offer or baiting two of the malformed, overgrown invertebrates, so they could meet at a certain point and kill one another.
Despite his competence and lack of accrued wounds, however, the fatigue, and thirst he thought managed soon struck back with a vengeance, for the trek was long and torturous. A test of endurance and wit, where time ceased to be and the maze seemed to gain a life of its own. He soon came to realize that most of the deaths that cluttered the floor were not due to devilish contraptions or unearthly beasts, but human need in its rawest, most desperate form. With the damp, rotten air drowning his lungs, copious sweat drenching his frame, and each step a grueling act of willpower, he felt the reaper and its scythe looming overhead, but when he was about to fall over and take a final rest over the river of remains, a faint, familiar pull lifted his chin, and what he then felt invigorated him in an instant.
It was a light breeze, still damp but fresh, caressing his frame, coming from the end of the tunnel. He ran.
Feeling lighter with every step, he reached the opening at the end of the passageway in no time at all. There he came upon a massive, dome-like opening, with an enormous, circular platform of stone standing in the middle. In the center of the platform, held high by what appeared to be a colossal, black monolith, glowed a bright red light that illuminated the cupola with a lulling scarlet glow. A shine that called for him.
He forced himself to a halt. Not a second later and he would have fallen right into a bottomless pit that surrounded the stone platform, a moat of nothingness, hidden by a clever trick of perspective, and of more than thrice a man's length. There was no bridge.
He retreated a fair bit, breathed in deep, and grasped the rocky walls to gather his strength. A sudden smile grew on his face.
The rock…it is drenched, covered in mist…of course! The oasis! This chamber must be located right underneath it!
He wiped the sweat off his face and watered his lips with the moisture of the stone. He flung his makeshift club and green-lit amulet over to the platform and after a quick cracking of joints and testing of muscles, took a few steps back, gathered all the strength his legs could muster, and sprinted.
As he leaped high and far, halfway towards the platform, a terrifying pulling sensation invaded his every sense. Time stopped as he glanced down in midair at the eternal darkness of the pit. There was nothing, or rather, it was nothing, and he knew for his own good that he should not gaze upon it any longer.
His strength waned during that fraction of a second. The slope of his long jump faltered, brought down by the ignominious forces that dwelled in the abyss. However, he knew this was not to be his grave, for his death would be in combat with a blaze of glory. Drawing might with a barbaric roar of earth and homeland, he reached out and caught on to the fine edge of the platform. He swung himself over with haste, breaking free from the voracious nothing that lurked beneath.
With a huff, he rolled a fair distance away from the edge of the platform, grabbed his crystal and club, and picked himself up. As he rose, he came upon face-to-face with the mesmerizing sight.
There, in the middle of the platform, was a golden cup; held up high by the ebon stone hand of what he could now tell was not a monolith, but the enormous statue of an armor-clad, sword-wielding man ten times his size. Its shape was identical to the figurines that once decorated the witch's lair and the one that hung on the neck of that young boy from the market, but these were all afterthoughts to him, for inside the gold cup was a jewel the size of his two, large fists combined. It glowed a bright, mesmerizing shade of scarlet. It shone like riches not of this earth. It called to him as a siren called the sailor.
The Jewel of the Ages.
Conan trudged the pattern-covered, clean-cut platform, uncaring of the faint, aged hues of red spread about the floor, the signs of mended cracks, and the sorcerous sigils spread throughout. He climbed the colossus in a dream-like trance and reached for the cup, his eyes wide with unnatural hunger; the tip of his fingers a hair's breadth away from the stone of glorious red hues.
The hairs on the back of his neck rose, and the jewel flickered out from existence.
As the golden cup fell, he let go of his club and crystal and leaped backward as would a tiger inches away from the cold grip of death. The echoing, resounding impact of the statue's sword rang heavy in his ears. A blow that would have left him as naught more than another smear marring the stone. A malicious, booming cackle followed.
From an open wound in space and time, appeared a slob of a man. He floated high above the platform, wrapped in the scarlet energy of the jewel that levitated by his side. The finest clothes and garments covered his corpulent frame, as did dozens of invaluable rings on his stubby fingers. However, this morbid weakness belied the blood-red hue of his eyes and the malignant power of his being.
"Greetings, barbarian."
"You…you are Haqir, are you not? You certainly fit the description well!" he shouted with half-hearted bravado, as he widened his distance from the now immobile statue, glancing at the flattened, golden cup, and the whitish powdery remains of bone and amulet beneath its ebon blade.
"You are rather clever for a savage out of his element. Nevertheless, I am afraid that the last of that old witch's foolish endeavors shall end no more different from the rest... disastrously," Haqir scoffed. "She thought she could hide your presence from me, can you believe that? What a pathetic old crone. Nothing escapes me, barbarian, nothing! You are but an open book to me!"
Conan let out a mock laugh and shook his head.
"If you know me so well, then tell me, why am I not yet another pile of dry marrow decorating your little playground?" He pointed a finger at the floating man. "No, It is you who shall meet a disastrous end, sorcerer! I have bested all your meager tricks and traps, and by Crom, and should there still remain I shall best them all the same!"
Haqir chortled, his augmented voice shaking the chamber.
"Your confidence is most amusing; admirable, even! That I must concede to as well," he sighed. "If only she could have found more idiots of your caliber, then perhaps, perhaps I would have let her live. If only to entertain me further anyway. An acquired taste I have you see, of daring opposition and crushing it with my feet."
Conan smirked. "Your mirth does not faze me, corpulent devil. Are you perhaps too much of a coward to come down and face me, and instead you laugh like a lowly hyena deeming itself the king of beasts? Do you not control forces beyond my understanding and my flesh? Or are you no more than an illusionist, holding a harmless spectacle with myself as your sole, and dissatisfied, spectator?"
Haqir grinned and from one moment to the next, what were once normal eyes and teeth turned into slits and rows upon rows of razor-sharp black needles, and his voice became as cold as the northern wastelands during the harshest of its winters.
"Oh dear me, you do not disappoint, Conan of Cimmeria. That wit of yours has actually made me reconsider my methods! Why waste more time sending you to fumble about in the rest of my dungeons or towers in pointless pursuit? Your death by fatigue would be a most dreadful and boring thing for me to endure. That is why I shall grant you the greatest honor for your savage people: a warrior's death!"
The sorcerer made a gesture by weaving his hands, and with it, his pupils went into the back of his eyes as if in a trance, and the chamber began to rumble.
Conan turned back and saw the enormous statue shivering, its stone eyes glowing red. His instincts cried out, and so he listened. He crouched, tensed every fiber of his cord-like musculature, and readied himself for the onslaught that would follow.
The statue lumbered its way towards the barbarian, covering the ground with few steps, but though slow of chase, it was its ensuing flurry of splattering strikes that proved Conan's bane. Fast as lightning and twice as deadly, the blows wore down his stamina as he spent precious energy evading death's grasp, with each sidestep and every last moment leap, but despite his signs of fatigue, there was nevertheless a plan in motion. Mere moments after the first swing, he noted that it was Haqir's floating movements the statue followed. It was as if a puppet, and whenever the effigy struck the stone platform with its sword, a light fluctuation shook the sorcerer's shape.
There was an eldritch connection between the two, one that left Haqir ignorant of the world beyond the blood lusted suit of stone the man now dwelt in and the Cimmerian flesh he so sought to splatter in a berserk rage. There was no strategy, no true martial ability beyond the strength and speed of his colossal puppet.
As Conan well surmised, Haqir was nothing more than an overconfident amateur outside of his element, and he was not about to let such a weakness go unexploited.
Through intensive dodging and misdirection, he led the statue towards the edge of the platform, where at once he put his plan to the test, leaping at the very moment before the effigy's strike could have sent him straight into the afterlife. However, the attempt failed, the sheer weight of the statue prevented such a misstep into the abyss, even when lured so far into the edge of the platform. It instead removed its sunken blade from the cavern wall with frightening ease and resumed pursuit.
Still, said failure only brought further possibilities to his course of action, for its lengthy stab caved in part of the stone beyond the precipice, and from those cracks poured water, powerful, pressurized bursts of water, searching for an exit, and though his adrenaline was beginning to fade, the promise of victory against Haqir more than made up for it. Evading blows that would have turned him into nothing more than scarlet mist, he once again drew the statue's attention back to the same spot where it had caved in the rock with its might.
He readied himself, expecting yet another predictable attack, but his blood ran cold. During that decisive moment, something else glowed in that red gaze, something that spoke to the deepest recesses of his soul, but these were not the unspoken words of a coward sorcerer, this was an entity hidden inside the ebon effigy.
The words of a warrior. A hero. A legend.
In a fraction of a heartbeat, Conan's fear became awe and kinship. The statue that loomed over him was not a puppet, but a prison, an ebon cage that held the soul of a fighter much like himself. Then, in one last flash of defiance, unearthed by facing a mirror image of a different era, the statue gave him a silent expression of respect, a wordless fellowship that only a fellow legend could understand.
Conan stood still. The statue struck.
Pieces of clattering rock flew in a resounding crash that echoed throughout the dome of stone. From it exploded a powerful torrent, which blasted the shape of the ebon statue. It moved not an inch, but the snapping sound of bone and flesh, Haqir's sharp cry of pain, and the dull thud that followed told him everything he needed to know. However, soon after, a deep, sonorous loud crack came about, breaking him out of his triumphant stupor. The statue—no, the warrior's prison was breaking, collapsing under its own weight.
He rolled and jumped out of the way. As he looked back, the colossus fell and broke apart into a thousand pieces, dropping into the endless void, but he felt no sorrow for the loss. There was nothing inside that prison anymore. Muharib was free.
And now, time for my reward.
He drank a scoopful from the fresh torrent water that now covered the stone platform and turned around, refreshed at last. The image of Haqir's twisted, bloodied shape, laying on the opposite end of the podium, filled him with much-needed mirth, but that joy paled compared to what he felt as he laid his eyes on the glowing gem resting at the center. With jovial steps, he made his way to the legendary treasure. Freshened and revitalized, he would take the jewel and best a dungeon whose layout was now clear. His joy grew hundredfold, as the tip of his middle finger neared the gleaming surface of the magical stone.
Haqir screamed.
He flinched back. The raw pain of Haqir's wails shook him down to the marrow. It frightened him with a notion of empathy he held not for the practitioners of the eldritch. It was a cry of desperation, clear in the sorcerer's milky-white eyes. Whatever it was Haqir mastered, the sorcerer no longer controlled.
The sight bristled every nerve and hair in his body. Haqir's head snapped and the blanched-out whites where the sorcerer's pupils had once been now stared at him and him only, and what he saw was hatred in its pure form.
Now no more than a dying animal in its final rage, Haqir summoned all his remaining, malign powers and extended his mangled hand towards Conan, reaching for him. The chamber painted itself a hellish red, and the disembodied voices of the damned sang a chorus meant not for the ears of man.
Conan covered his ears and grimaced as he felt his mind slip away into something worse than death, but his eyes he could not shut, not when hundreds of portals opened up around the edges of the stone platform, and hundreds upon hundreds of red-hued soldiers poured in from the arcane gates. An all-encompassing wave of blades and pikes came after him and there was no escape.
With a pained effort, he let go of his ears and closed his eyes. He focused, blocking out the horror of the world around him. He cleared his mind and stood proud, knowing that he would at least die by the touch of steel. Then, the clanging of hundreds of swords and pikes and the thuds of hundreds of shapes echoed in his ears and the voices sang no more.
He opened his eyes and rubbed them, it was no illusion. The chamber no longer glowed a hellish tone of scarlet, and all around him were the laying figures of unconscious soldiers. As he looked through his surroundings, his eyes widened in further surprise.
Haqir was dead, split in two, his expression frozen in hatred. An emerald smoke of arcane energy billowed out from the division of his corpse and his spilled innards.
Conan darted his sights with haste and found the cloaked shape of the witch. The old woman lay near the edge of the platform, immobile, facing him. He saw her scarred, burnt face from afar, and in its fading light of life, he saw gratitude. He swiped the gem and ran towards the dying woman. The stone gleamed no more, save for a small glitter in its center. As he arrived, he placed the jewel in her emaciated hands. At that moment, the Jewel of the Ages lost its final flicker and crumbled to dust. What followed was a flash of verdant green light that blinded him for a short moment.
He rubbed his eyes, blinked, and gazed upon an awe-inspiring sight looming above him.
The witch was now young, beautiful, and powerful, floating above the grisly scene with a fey-like semblance and an aura of pulsating energy. Far different her presence was from that of the late Haqir, however, for hers emitted energy of nurture and life, that caressed his body and cleansed his soul.
"Conan of Cimmeria, I am forever thankful." Her ethereal eyes were wide and kind. "But I do suppose it is answers that you want," she paused, hesitant. "…You see, I am not who you believe, I am Amira—"
Conan waved nonchalantly.
"Worry not, witch. I can well surmise the rest myself," he sighed and scooped up some of the water pooled over the many unconscious bodies, and drank from it. "All I wish for is to return to the surface. I have had enough of sorcery for one day."
Amira's ethereal gaze grew puzzled.
"But, what about your reward?"
He chuckled. "You said it yourself, as many other speakers of fortunes have done before you. I am to become king one day, and when that day comes, I shall visit your land with my armies, covering the sands of the desert with my banners and my hard-earned glory." He drank some more and wiped his face with his forearm.
"Pray then, witch, that Crom hold back the tip of my blade should I find your words to be lies. Your so-called promise will be my reward that day. Pay heed to my words and leave me be."
A sad smile showed across Amira's features. She gave him a regal bow.
"Pay heed I will." Her expression grew mischievous. "But I am not about to let you leave empty-handed, Cimmerian; this you too must pay heed to. Is there not anything you wish to claim? Not a throne or title, not treasures beyond imagination? Anything?"
"No."
"I am afraid I must insist. A favor I must grant you at the very least."
He sighed and scratched the back of his neck, then, his eyes fell on the flattened gold cup nearby. He smirked.
V
Hasan knew better than to argue with his mother, so he kept quiet throughout her reprimands. Later, seeking to amend things over dinner—which her mother ate little of and gave him the rest, without room for debate—he spoke of the unbelievable story of today's escapades.
To Hasan's chagrin, no matter the grandiose of his diction or the details he embellished, his mother paid no heed to the tale of the imposing Cimmerian. Nor did she so much as blink as he told her how the barbarian crashed through the market, chased by hordes of Haqir's men, and then escaped without so much as leaving a trace. He did however leave out the part where said barbarian took part of his rightfully stolen coin, as payment for diverting the attention of the soldiers that took after him—and the part where he himself stole it.
Not long after, the late afternoon sun fell on the horizon and the calming veil of the night blanketed the city. They retired to the creaking pair of beds of their humble, wall-less apartment, and fell asleep. Or so his mother did, for he could not manage to do so.
Quiet as a whisper, he placed his dinner by the nightstand next to his mother's bed: the mashed-up pieces of bread he had pretended to eat. Then, he climbed out of the open windowsill of their fifth-story apartment and went on with the routine of his sleep-less nights: to climb to the top and gaze upon the stars. To imagine and ponder until his eyelids grew heavy.
He reached the roof of the communal building with relative ease, each time a little easier than before, but what he found that night was far from the usual sight of a starry night and dusty rooftops.
It was a large cup of pure, glittering, solid gold. How it sparkled and shined beneath the moonlight, with a luster that went beyond the confines of the imagination, as if a treasure crafted by magic.
As his mind ran through the possibilities this miraculous occurrence brought for his home, all the good that it would bring, a shifting shadow caught the corner of his eye. He turned around and saw a supple, familiar shape moving, leaping from rooftop to rooftop, with movements wild, precise, and powerful like those of a mountain cat, until finally, it disappeared from sight.
Hasan gripped his necklace and smiled. He knew better than to look up to thieves, and yet, he did not care.