Grey clouds were on the march. Some were moving against the wind. Many were going against the tide of birds and creatures fleeing the mountain. Few were noticed, and those that were became only a passing curiosity to a yordle farmer.
One such farmer grumbled about the weather forecasters messing up again, but then went right back to his paper, the main story titled, "League to Reopen with New Champion, Former Pest"
Only one yordle watched the clouds with any form of curiosity. Her eyes now normal-looking, Lendi watched as the clouds converged above the abandoned castle. Once they met, they twisted around each other, spinning in a slow grey dance.
She would have to ask Veigar why these clouds were like this… once she defeated him.
She stood in an open courtyard of the castle, wearing her chosen combat outfit: a deep purple dress that was loose, but also clung to her shoulders, waist, and magically refused to leave a small circle around her feet (unless she had to sprint). Even the arms of the dress seemed to billow softly like full sails of silk.
She turned her eyes to the abandoned castle. The once-great-fortress crested a peak of one of the Sablestone mountains. The mountain range split Yordle Land from the rest of Valoran, and the castle sat on one of the highest peaks, so high that some of the lower grey clouds obscured it from view.
It looked like a meteor had flown in diagonally, taking out the upper floors and leaving only one two-story wall, while clearing out the half of the first floor's ceiling. Knowing how powerful some mages were in the Rune Wars, such a meteor was not impossible in the slightest.
Lendi scanned the rocks, some rooms still holding a roof, others reduced to a pile of boulders. She appreciated the ancient architecture, but she was mostly looking for Veigar, her master. She also knew she had been standing out in the open long enough.
Not that anyone could see her. She had cast an invisibility spell on herself, a higher tier one she might add. But Veigar knew what she had been studying. She could only assume he was using Revealing spells.
She squatted down and began to run along a lower wall, then turned into a still-standing corridor. She had no clue about the layout of the castle… but that gave her an idea.
She focused on a Mapping spell, then silently released it - she refused to shout out every spell like her flamboyant master. The green magic travelled along stones, leaving a purple wake that also faded. But it travelled out from her original position.
Knowing this, Lendi pulled out one of her favorite spells, her first custom spell. A personalized short-range teleport.
Lendi twisted, her long, fluid purple dress flapping out around her, growing so as to cover all of her, reaching up like a tongue of purple flame. Then the cloak receded into the ground, its owner gone.
Veigar cast a quick Hiding spell as the Mapping spell ran over him. For once, he was not yelling his spells, because he knew her methods. If he revealed himself, he lost the little game they were playing.
Lendi had been doing astronomically, he reckoned. She had nearly mastered several passive spells, including one that silenced her other spells. The dead-quiet Mapping spell was a perfect example, usually travelling with a soft hiss.
It wasn't Veigar's intent to produce a silent assassin, but his apprentice would become what she wished. She had yet to get a sense of how to fight, but, as with everything Lendi did with magic, her ability grew exceedingly faster than any mage Veigar had met; he left himself out because most other mages had teachers, while Veigar killed or turned mad any teacher he met (after extracting every bit of knowledge from them).
And Lendi had the best teacher in Runeterra. Veigar let his chest puff out a bit before realizing that Lendi now knew the entire castle's layout, which gave her a positional advantage.
She might beat me this time… no no, she's too rash. She will jump out of nowhere, then-
A distant creak caught Veigar's attention. It sounded ominously similar to one of Lendi's specialties. Veigar slowed his careful step to a whisper. It was a scout, and he didn't want to be found yet. Veigar looked around quickly, then saw a hole in the floor nearby, leading to the basement.
Lendi looked down the stairs. She had a few scouts checking, but none had gone into the basement. All the other abandoned "border forts" she and Veigar had fought in were simply towers. This was the largest and least destroyed (saying a lot about the other towers, some of which were only platforms).
If Veigar were down there, he might be setting up runes or any other form of ambush. The basement filled the entire lower floor, and was a maze of corridors.
Suddenly a wicked idea came to her. She froze as she realized the danger to Veigar's life, but then she remembered being beaten the two times before.
She prepared a spell, while staring intently down the stairs.
If he was down there, he could handle it. If not, he would not be so foolish so as to journey down there.
Just to be sure, she relaxed the enchantments a bit.
Veigar wished he were fighting anyone but Lendi at this point. Many champions had good night-vision, but equilibrium's passive effect on the eyes caused the night to look like a blue and silver day to Veigar and his student.
The unlit basement was all light-grey to Veigar. None of the woodwork had survived the years, except what had been enchanted, which was stolen by now. He imagined, otherwise, that there would be torture devices, and other horrible things.
His thoughts trailed off when he saw a set of rusted kitchen knives. Maybe the torturer had a sense of humor?
His ears twitched under his hat. He heard a spell. It made no physical sound, but it was a somewhat large one, if not very hard. He could tell simply by how long he had been dealing with magic.
Then he felt the ground shaking slightly.
Maybe she's riding a- oh that WITCH!
The ground's tremble was from a very easy but also possibly chaotic spell. Cast it in a bucket, and the bucket became full of spiders. It was usually just a crowd pleaser.
Veigar turned around and fled towards his original entrance.
"Cast it in a basement, and same thing," Veigar grumbled to himself. "Smart. She probably charmed them to be a bit more dangerous. But she might be a bit tired from casting in such a large container."
He finally saw the hole, and the line of floating rocks he had used as stairs. The trembling was on his heels now.
Almost there... five stairs, five hops...
With a grit of his teeth and curses at his lifestyle of sitting in one place for long amounts of time, he bounded up the five steps into the stormy air. The wave crashed over and passed the stone steps behind him.
He didn't worry about dropping the stones, since the spiders never filled past the point where they were cast.
Veigar bent over, taking long breaths, then sighed in a mix of pride and relief. He did not want to find out how often Ezreal had to use Arcane Shift while exploring.
Then he felt something hairy move on his shoulder.
"AAAAAAAAAGH!"
He jumped and spun, a large tarantula falling off. His eyes widened momentarily at the beast.
"IGNESCO!"
Immediately, the Tarantula burst into flames. It cringed and then lay still, a small campfire. He heaved another sigh of relief, before hearing a LOT of creaking.
He spun to see a skeleton running at him from a distant doorway, a simple single-edged bone sword in one hand. For a moment, its blue eyes turned purple, before turning blue again.
"So she knows where I am, eh?"
He spun his staff and aimed it at the skeleton. "Fragmentum!"
The creature fell apart, each bone split in half. She didn't add spell protection. She might have more mana than I thought.
Suddenly, purple flames of silk sparked up across a courtyard to Veigar's left.
"Evening, Veigar."
Veigar smirked. "Are you sure it's not night time?"
Lendi scowled at the jab. "No pleasantries? Hmph."
Veigar, trying to keep the mood, quickly grumbled out, "We'll cover correct prelude to battles in a later practice. FOR NOW, LET'S DANCE!"
It sounded a bit strange, but he rolled with it.
Veigar immediately cast a Royal Blue, a slowly accelerating blue orb, with four smaller orbs spiraling around it.
Lendi only smirked. She pulled back her arm, warning Veigar to her signature skillshot spell. He wondered if she would throw it straight down again?
But she had been practicing. A throwing knife, a dark wine color, materialized in her hand. She threw it perfectly at the center orb. Not a meter out, four other knives materialized, all swiftly striking the four bolts, which had been expanding out. Sangria's Silence.
As soon as the knives hit their targets, they shattered, the pieces hanging in the air. Then Lendi pulled her hand back in a fist, and each piece became a knew knife. She pointed her hand at Veigar, and all two dozen knives arched and converged on Veigar.
"Seems you mastered the throwing and the second part," Veigar casually commented. With a flick of his wrist, he pointed his staff at the approaching knives.
"PONDUS."
A grey orb formed in the flight path of the knives. It began to glow, and the knives flying towards and past the orb were suddenly dragged into it, all converging on the new point of gravity.
Veigar did not relent until all the knives were a fragmented sphere of dark purple metal. He released the spell, and the ball fell to the ground with a clank.
Veigar could see the definition of Sangria's Silence replaying in Lendi's head. "Despite being a magical spell and doing magical damage, the spell can also bear physical properties if it hits anything other than a person, or is affected by certain spells."
Lendi crossed her arms huffily, her face forming a pout. But it did not last long. "Let's stop playing," she said while grinning.
Suddenly, blue flames leapt up in front of Lendi, and three skeletons were there, limbering up. Each wore iron armor, while one had a double-edged sword, the second had a short poleaxe, and the third had a hewing spear with an extra-long blade and a shield.
Lendi wasn't a necromancer, something that made even Veigar shudder, but she was quickly becoming an accomplished summoner with a specialty in the undead. In other words, she could turn a corpse into a minion as much as Garen could, yet she could weave undead knights from the air.
For minion summoners, quality beat quantity.
Lendi's skeletons wore iron armor, brandished steel weapons, and, by the way they were studying Veigar, weren't your usual charge-and-slash minion, or even your micro-controlled zombie, but directed soldiers. It cost more magic to cast, but allowed the summoner to use other spells instead of constantly puppeteering.
So that's what she'd been studying since the last practice. Hmm, five days of advanced summoning reading is nothing to throw a book at.
In a wave of her hands, several buffs overcame her skeletons. Veigar tried to catch which buff it was. The first had a green shield meld into its armor and bones, the second had a blue, while he missed the shield bearer's buff.
At a silent command, Lendi urged the first two to charge forward. Veigar immediately grabbed the sphere of purple metal and smashed it into the poleaxe bearer, causing it to get blasted backwards. He then spun and aimed his staff at the sword-bearing skeleton.
"BALEFUL STRIKE!" Veigar's signature move went right through Lendi's physical protection buff, causing the skeleton to snap in half. He felt the skeleton's power transfer into Veigar, another perk of the spell.
The other skeleton, with the poleaxe, got up, and again charged Veigar. Even though it had a magical protection buff, it was still vulnerable to physical attacks. Veigar picked up the sphere of metal, and flung it at the skeleton again.
This time, the skeleton dove to the side. At the same time, he felt a pull of magic from Lendi, and the skeleton disappeared in purple flames, appearing on the other side of the sphere of metal as it flew by.
Smart. Teleporting the skeleton too far would use all of her mana. But just far enough to negate damage... I can't let her see my next attack.
Veigar kept control of the sphere of metal, but did not directly fling it. Instead, out of the view of both Lendi and the skeleton, he flung it skyward. He sneaked a peek upward. Good, they were in an open area. He stayed stock still as the skeleton charge him. When it was three steps from Veigar, the metal sphere came crashing down, flattening the skeleton.
Lendi's look of hope vanished. He also caught a look of relief, due to the fact that Veigar had in fact protected himself, and not been gutted by her minion.
Veigar turned his attention to the last minion. A question arose unbidden in his mind. They are intelligent, but are they loyal?
Veigar knew nearly nothing (relative to his other areas) of summoning, but he knew a way to test.
He whispered a spell, and the sphere went flying not at the skeleton, but at Lendi. To Veigar's surprise, the skeleton's flaming blue eyes seemed express surprise, as they locked onto the projectile. It leaped in front of the sphere, shield up, spear behind to brace. It had moved so fast, Veigar realized it's buff was neither physical nor magical protection, but a speed buff.
So it could get to me quickly.
The sphere was flying so fast, it smashed the skeleton into individual bones, but it was just enough resistance for the sphere to fall to the ground and stop at Lendi's feet.
Veigar smiled thinly. Lendi knew to make her minions loyal to her. He looked up to congratulate Lendi, but then saw her dejected look as she stared at the pile of bones.
She breathed out through her nose to calm herself, then crouched and held a hand out at the skeleton. Suddenly the bones rattled and all came together. The skeleton stood up, looking at itself, then looking back at its master. Veigar couldn't see its reaction, but it seemed confused..
Veigar could only agree. "You know simply summoning another one costs far less mana." At least he knew that much about summoning.
Then Lendi did something even more useless. She stood and aimed her palm at the creature.
In a burst of purple flames, it disappeared.
Veigar face-palmed. His anger rose from the pain of wearing a metal glove. "You use mana to heal it, THEN you de-summon it? Despite the mana you get back from de-summoning, you still LOSE mana overall!"
At least, it looked like de-summoning. But then he felt something was off about it. He mentally shrugged it off. He didn't know that much about summoning.
"Alright, summon your horde! Let's finish this, I'm getting hungry."
Usually, Lendi summoned three times the skeletons, using all her mana, but at least giving Veigar some target practice. However, instead of several small pools of flame, one larger pool of flame grew in the center of the courtyard. When it was three times as wide as Veigar's height, it stopped growing, and the flames went out to reveal a twelve foot skeleton.
The four and a half foot yordle (hat included) blinked. He didn't know what this meant in necromancy terms, but he knew that Lendi was one of the fastest learners he had ever met, besides himself.
It wore pure steel, complete with intricate designs (he swore he could see some flowers and… mushrooms?), and had a double-bladed longsword. Then suddenly smoke grew around the skeleton, hiding it completely. Veigar didn't know what was going on, but he readied himself, putting one foot back, and aiming his staff.
Then he felt the pull of magic. She's hiding what buffs she's putting on them!
Since Veigar had been taken by surprise by the buffs in their last practice, he had made sure to remember what buffs were what color. Lendi was counter-adapting.
Suddenly, the behemoth came charging out of the smoke. For being so big, it did not lumber like one might think, nor did it swing slowly. It was as swift as its smaller counterparts.
Grrr, more running.
Veigar ducked under the lethal blade as the monster swung it, then ran.
He quickly cast a banishing spell, to no effect. He tried another Royal Blue over his shoulder as he ran to the creature's right. It flew at the behemoth, the four outer points converging on the explosion. There was not even a dent.
"Can't hurt Schmidt like that," came Lendi's voice, laced in a victorious crow.
"DON'T NAME IT!" Veigar shouted from his hiding place behind a crumbled wall.
Veigar picked up the sphere and threw it at the creature's left side. "Schmidt" simply caught it. It then dropped the sphere in front of it, and kicked it like a pro, right at Veigar. The mage dove and avoided it, but the wall where he was just taking cover was obliterated.
"So protected from both magic and physical weapons. I guess there is only one thing left to do."
As the skeleton began to charge again, Veigar flourished his staff. A shadow grew in the path of the charging skeleton. Right as the skeleton stepped on the shadow, Dark Matter landed right on its skull. The magic pierced the buff, the armor, and the skeleton's head, ribcage, and hipbone. It even went through the floor. Several spiders came flying out of the crater in the ground.
Lendi just stared, flabbergasted at the sheer level of magical power. Suddenly, a cage appeared around her, and she was lifted into the air, dark navy bars of magic holding her onto a small platform of the same magic.
"Hey, no fair and… no fair!"
"What?"
"Ugh, that spell is stupid!" Her glowing eyes burned brighter.
Veigar laughed. "No spell is stupid, just your defenses are. And I am tired of running and I'm hun-"
Suddenly, Veigar went quiet as he studied Lendi. Then he yelled, "INCURVO!"
The bars around Lendi suddenly twisted like thread, closing around Lendi, then squeezing until she disappeared with a "Pop!"
Purple silk flew into the air, but before it could dissipate, a very angry Lendi came walking out. "Why did you do that?"
"It was obvious, I-"
"No, it wasn't! That clone was perfect!"
Veigar gave her a glare that silenced her, before continuing. "You forgot the illusion spell for the eyes."
Lendi's mouth opened in retort, but then closed both eyes and mouth in irritation.
Veigar smiled in triumph. "So I have won three."
"Shut up."
Veigar only smiled wider. "So shall I cast the teleport home spell?"
"I'll do it!" Lendi said resolutely.
Veigar rose a brow. "Really, are you sure you have the mana?"
Lendi summoned a portal, revealing Bilgewater.
"Ok fine, you do, but quickly change it to the castle before anything unpleasant comes through."
So where did I get yordle height from you ask?
Google "league of legends champion height", it's a League forum post by a boss named "wapster". It's a cool comparison.
Have any suggestions for improvements? Let me know.
What? Where have I been all this- oh my gosh look, another chapter! (runs aways)
(BTW THANX FOR ALL THE FOLLOWS, EVEN WITH THE LONG UPDATE, YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME) (srry caps)