Chapter 18: Eve of a New Dawn
"How dare you traverse into my dominion, Judge!" roars the Lich, pointing his staff at the other champion. Elias scoffs and jumps down from the rock and eyes Karthus. "I'd suggest you watch your tone with me Karthus. Or have you forgotten what I can do to those of the Shadow Isles?" he says with a smirk. The Lich scowls and shakes his head, "Your accursed powers are indeed potent against those of the Shadow Isles, but you are yet to fight me with them against my legion of the dead!" With that the Deathsinger raises his staff and book and begins chanting. The ground cracks open and from the fissures come hordes of the undead. They all screech and gnash their teeth at the Judge and the Demacian soldiers, but the latter simply shrugs and raises a hand at them. "Burn." whispers the Judge.
In an instant the entire ghoulish army erupted into dark violet flames. They all shrieked out in pain and slowly disintegrated back into the ground that they rose from, causing a look of what could be described as horror to appear on the Lich's undead face. "W-what?! How?!" asks Karthus at the sight of his army of ghouls being completely wiped out. "I see you forgot that me being the Judge of the Fallen allows me to control the dead as well." Elias responds with a smirk. The Deathsinger grits his jaw and begins to summon another army of ghouls once more. "Everyone to me!" yells Elias. They all group on him and the Judge slams his hand into the swamp, summoning a large portal from underneath them which swallows him and the Demacians into it. After they had disappeared, Karthus looked at the spot his next victims were just at and growled. "This will not be the last you hear from me Judge! Their time as well as yours will come to and end soon enough!" roars the furious Lich.
When they arrive on the other side of the portal, Jarvan III and his men are greeted with a familiar setting: The Grand Plaza located in Demacia. The king looks to the Judge and bows his head in gratitude. Elias tips the edge of his hood to the King of Demacia before stepping back into a smaller black portal. Seconds after he had come through on the other side, the Judge collapsed into a seat that was meticulously located behind him. "Holy hell that was rough." he sighs. When he looked up he saw Syndra sitting there with Zed instead of his group that he had left earlier. "Zed. Syndra." Elias says with a head bow to each of them. They both look at him confusedly before greeting him as well.
"Uh... Hello there Judge. What um, brings you here?" asks Syndra politely, yet obviously confused. "Well I was supposed to re-appear next to my friends that were sitting here at this table, but it appears that a couple of hours have passed since then." he replies bluntly. She gives a confused nod and looks over to Zed who had slipped his mask back onto his face. "Well sorry to interrupt your date. I'll go find my friends now. Hey Yasuo! I came back for the bill!" Elias says before getting up and walking towards the kitchen. "Yeah, yeah. It'll cost you 200 gold for the meal, plus me telling you where your friends went." says the swordsman with his hand stretched out. The Judge shrugs and hands him the money before looking up at him, "So where did they go off to?" Yasuo pockets the money and points towards the north.
"They went that way towards Irelia's home. She arrived roughly half an hour after you had left and invited your little band to join her. The Judge nods his head and waves goodbye to both the swordsman and the champion couple on his way out. Once outside, he noticed that it was already dark out. "Hm. Looks like I was out longer than I thought." he says before facing the north and closing his eyes. A faint aura of power surrounds Elias as he begins to mutter to himself. A few minutes later he opens his eyes and stretches his arms out. "Found them." he says with a smile. The silver-clad champion arcs up his hand and summons a portal before him and promptly steps through it. Once on the other side however he was greeted with various blades being pointed at him.
"Who the hell are you?" barks one of the men holding a spear. "You'd think I would expect this by now but... nope". Elias thinks to himself. "I came here to retrieve my friends that are staying at Miss Irelia's home. This is it, isn't it?" Elias asks the man. Once he had made mention of meeting his friends, the group of armed guards lowered their weapons and bowed at him. "Lady Irelia has been expecting you Judge. This way." says the same guard with the spear. The Judge nods his head and follows the guard deeper into the home and he is astonished at the amount of decor was around. Various paintings of Ionian origin were strewn throughout the halls, but there were even other decorations from other regions of Valoran that were present as well. A few minute later the duo had arrived at what Elias deduced to be a study of some sort. The guard knocks on the door and a few moments later Irelia opens it. "Ah, Judge. Welcome to my home. Thank you Susanoo, I'll take him from here."
With that the guard bows to her and takes his leave while Irelia and Elias walk into the study. The Ionian gestures to a pair of seats and they both sit down before Irelia starts to pour herself a drink. "Want one?" she asks. "No thank you, I'm good." She nods and pours herself a glass of a dark brown liquid before taking a swig of it. "Thanks for taking my friends to your home for the night. I appreciate it." the Judge says with a small nod. Irelia shakes her head and takes another sip of her drink, "It's nothing at all. Just helping out a few friends is all." He nods slightly and sighs while relaxing into the chair more. The two sit there in silence while Irelia goes through her beverage slowly. "You know she likes you right?" says the Ionian with a sly look on her face. Elias sits there in his zoned out state before leaning back up moments later.
"Yeah... I know." he replies exhaling. "Wait you know? Then why lead her on for so long?" she exclaims. "I don't know its... too surreal? I guess that would be the right word for it." Elias tells her. "Explain Elias or you're in a world of hurt for leading on someone like Riven." Irelia says threateningly. "You know how I'm from a different world where all of this is just a game right? Well in my world... people kind of develop crushes on the fictional characters of the League. Riven was... well mine. So me, you know, suddenly arriving and living in my favorite game is a dream come true but... for whatever reason I can't process Riven liking me."
Irelia eyes him wearily but ends up slumping down in her chair, "Well I guess that's a good enough reason. I mean where you come from, this would be a lot to take in" He replies with a half-hearted "mhm" and shifts his attention to the ceiling. The two champions then sit there in silence for what seems like hours. Hours do eventually pass when Elias notices Irelia missing from her chair. He looks over at a nearby clock hanging above her desk and notices the time is four in the morning. "Huh. I must have fallen asleep at some point for it to be that late." he ponders to himself. Why did you leave me...? speaks a ghostly voice.
Elias freezes in his chair upon hearing the voice. His body begins to tremble violently as a sweat begins to soak his forehead. The Judge slowly turns around and is met with a ghostly figure of a girl staring at him with tears rushing down her face. Why did you leave me all alone Axel? the ghost wails. "A-A-Alice?" Elias stutters. His eyes go wide as a rush of memories and emotions flood his mind. He collapses to the floor, curled up in the fetal position with his hands over his ears. Tears begin to form in his eyes and Elias starts repeating the phrases "You shouldn't be here," and, "It's not my fault" over and over again. Slowly hovering towards him, the ghost stretches its arms out and attempts to touch the Judge but is met with its hands going through him. The specter becomes furious at this and starts screaming at Elias, YOU SAID YOU WOULD NEVER LEAVE ME ALONE AND YOU LIED ABOUT THAT! IT'S YOUR FAULT THAT THINGS ENDED THE WAY THEY DID, AXEL! "No, no, no, no, no. P-please! It wasn't my fault!" he replies with tears now blurring his eyes.
"..ias... lias... Elias!" yells a voice in the distance. Elias jerks forward from his seat, his breathing ragged and his face clammy. He looks around to see the worried faces of Riven, Annie, Irelia, and D'Art staring at him. The Judge looks at D'Art briefly before summoning a portal beneath him and disappearing into it. "What the hell was that?!" exclaims Riven. They all look to D'Art who now has a nervous look on her face. "Zat... iz what happens if he stares into space for too long. He ends up getting sucked back into ze memories of his past, and the life of when he returned back to his world. And lets just say... both sets of memories are far from pleasant." she tells the group. "What do you mean by that?" asks Riven confusedly.
D'Art sits down and the group of champions look expectantly at her before continuing, "When he arrived back into his world he well... didn't exactly end up back when he thought he was. Six years was a lot of time for things to change and all of it was... a lot to take in. All of ze nations had just recovered from a third World War and various laws and regulations had been changed. Of course none of zis mattered to Elias because he was finally home. His first objective was to track down his family and former girlfriend but..."
"But what?" asks Riven half-knowing the answer. "At first he didn't know because when he found zem he believed zem to be alive, but ze revelation sunk in like an anchor. He had kept his champion powers from crossing over which let him recognize a familiar glow zat his family had around them: ze glow that only ze dead have. Zat's when ze truth had sunken in: everyone he had loved was dead." D'Artagnan says somberly. Upon hearing this Annie tries to hold back some tears by smothering her face in Tibbers but some leak out onto the stuffed bear, staining it. Riven and Irelia simply looked down at the floor with saddened expressions on their face. "After discovering zis," D'Art continued, "he fell into a deep state of depression. He wandered throughout his hometown for a month before running across myself and my now husband Victor. We were working for, at ze time, a group of fourty people zat kept ze peace between nations: Ze League of Peace, but we were lacking someone else to join us so ze council there could have one more for balance reasons. At first we thought he was a regular homeless man but ze large scythe he suddenly brought out and almost impaled himself with changed our minds."
"Elias... that must have been hell for him. Being able to see his dead family, and being unable to die to be with them..." Irelia whispers to herself. D'Art continues with how her husband stopped him and convinced the Judge to join them, their adventures as a team, Elias' haunting visions, and how the League of Peace's downfall had caused Elias to want to return to Runeterra to help prevent its own League from falling as well. "And ze rest you know." finished D'Art. "Well, most of it anyways." speaks up another voice. The group turns towards the doorway and there is standing Elias, his arms on his shoulders and looks not as frightened as before. "Sorry I-" he starts but is immediately embraced by Riven. "It's ok. You don't need to apologize." she says quietly to him. This caused Elias to smile and just hugs her back.
Irelia lets out a small cough and the two separate almost immediately. "Now that Elias is back, I was thinking of something that could lighten up the mood and I have the perfect thing: The Blossom Festival. Originally I had given Riven tickets just for the two of them, but hey! The more the merrier right?" the Ionian says with a smirk on her face. Elias looks at Riven who's face was now blushing and she gives a small nod, followed by Annie and D'Art nodding as well. "So its settled then. In a couple of days we'll meet up here and head to the festival. Sound like a plan you guys?" They all nod in agreement and spend the rest of the day in Ionia.
AN: Hey peeps. So here's the next chapter. I made it a little short since it was a continuation of the last chapter, that and I felt like I needed to put something out to show that I was still alive and not, you know. Dead. That, college kicking my ass, and 3 weeks ago I got my first tattoo (A Battle Bunny Riven one of course because waifu tattoo is best tattoo). Anyways, I hope you enjoy this chapter and I'll see you next time.