Evil Arrival
"TAKE THIS!" Quartzia angrily yelled at Angela, as she slammed her forelegs down on the ground, causing a large rock pillar with crystals sticking out of it to erupt from the icy ground in front of her. Swinging around gracefully, Quartzia struck the pillar with her mace shaped tail, launching the rock at the other dragoness. Before the rock could hit however, two small missiles shot out of slots on either side of the metal harness Angela wore. The projectiles hit the stone structure, sending crystals and rocks flying all over the field and raising a cloud of smoke where the pillar used to be. Suddenly, Angela flew out of the smoke created by the attack and tackled Quartzia, pinning her down onto the snow and rubble strewn ground.
"Stop it, Julie!" Angela yelled into Quartzia's face, trying to stop Quartzia from fighting before they caused an avalanche. "I didn't come here to interfere with your mission! I came here to help get Nina back!"
"DON'T CALL ME JULIE!" Quartzia angrily shouted at the mention of her former name.
Ever since the age of ten, Julie, the friendly and kind dragoness who had been friends with Angela, had started calling herself by the name Quartzia. Along with this name change however, came a complete personality change. Overnight, Julie had changed into Quartzia, the mean, bossy, self-centered, and not too bright popular girl who treated all her friends, except Fiera, like dirt. From that point onward, "Quartzia" would always get into fights with Angela, who continued to call her Julie despite the many other examples Quartzia had made of those who tried to do the same.
Sliding her tail between her and Angela, Quartzia launched Angela back across the field toward a group of pine trees that were opposite a narrow entrance out of the valley. Before she could hit the ground, a large, metal right arm suddenly shot out of the trees and grabbed Angela by the tail, leaving her swinging inches from the ground. The arm was built out of plates that were made of some strange metal that seemed to glow faintly with a sort of black light. It was covered all over with symbols, the most prominent being a large swirling symbol that looked like a backwards nine; the symbol for the Air element, located on the back of the razor-clawed hand.
Moments later, the strange, artificial arm was followed by an equally strange owner. The first thing that could be seen was a mask made of the same metal as the arm. It had a long, curved beak and only showed two gleaming red eyes with black slits for pupils. The rest of the body was covered by a black cloak with an upright hood that covered the rest of the head. The coat parted at the person's (who appeared to be male) knees, revealing long, black-scaled legs with bird-like talons. The robe was ripped up on the right side, where the metal arm was, but was fully intact on the other side, going down to the elbow of a clawed arm covered all over with gray feathers.
The two dragonesses stared in shock at the mysterious figure that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, until Angela finally broke the silence.
"Who the hell are you?" Angela asked the mysterious stranger in a rude tone.
"That is not important," said the stranger in a grave, echoing voice as the strange arm moved Angela so that her face was just inches from the mask. "The important thing is what you know of the location of a dragon by the name of Spark."
"And why would I tell you that?" Angela said snootily. For a few seconds, the stranger's red eyes scanned Angela's face, until he suddenly threw Angela into the nearby wall of the valley. Quartzia who was still watching nearby, involuntarily flinched at the sound of something breaking as Angela hit the rock wall, raising a large cloud of dust. Turning back to where the stranger was, Quartzia was surprised to find that he was gone without even leaving any footprints.
"Perhaps you can tell me," a voice behind the shocked Quartzia said. Turning around, Quartzia was even more shocked to find that the stranger had somehow gotten behind her without her noticing.
"Your one-horned dragon friend over there did not know," the strange creature continued as he began to kneel down to Quartzia's level, ignoring the dragoness' shocked expression. "Tell me, if you can, where a dragon by the name of Spark is."
At the end of this sentence, a fireball suddenly hit the stranger in the back of his head, lighting his hood on fire. "If you're looking for me, I'm right here!" a voice Quartzia recognized as belonging to Spark called out. A second later, Sparx ran into the valley through the entrance behind the stranger, quickly followed by Lefa and Triton, who was riding on Strike as always. Angela, who was beginning to pick herself out of the rubble created from her impact against the valley wall, face-palmed herself.
"Why does he always charges into these crazy situations like an idiot?" Angela asked herself, annoyed at Spark's stupidity.
The strange masked creature calmly stood up and, reaching behind his head with his large right arm, tore of the hood of his cloak. Looking up him, Quartzia was surprised to find that the stranger's head, which had a pair of long, elf-like ears and was covered all over with black scales and gray, hair-like feathers, had a row of small, curved horns running down the middle of his head from the rim of his mask to the base of his neck.
"Fire breath," the stranger said, as he threw the remains of his hood down on the ground. "An ability expected of a regular fire dragon, but I expected something different from somebody who can supposedly interfere with the Lords awakenings."
"I don't know anything about that," Spark said with a confused look. "All I'm trying to do is find my sister, Nina."
"I know," the stranger said. "He told me."
"'He'?" asked Spark, interested. "Who's He?"
"No one you will meet when I'm done with you," said the stranger, as a black pistol suddenly appeared in his left hand. "But please, allow me to introduce myself. I am Spee D. Mon of the Ten Demon Lords."
OOOOOOOO
"That's it, that's it!" Colin yelled out to Bouncer and Rubble Rouser, who had finally gotten the torn-off front of the Dread-Yacht back into place. "Great job fellas!"
As soon as the two ends of the ship were back into place, Rubble Rouser came over to Colin, who was standing in the snow on the ship's starboard (right) side. "So how are we gonna repair the ship so that we can get all the way back to the Citadel?"
"Obviously, we're not," Colin said, annoyed at Rubble Rouser for not figuring that out yet. "But if Bouncer uses his eye-lasers to weld together the metal on the outside and if Freeze Blade freezes the outside of the pipes that were ripped up, we'll be able to just make it to Woodburrow. Then I can call up Sharpfin to repair the Dread-Yacht properly. Then we can come back later to continue searching for that missing dragoness."
"Alright," Rubble Rouser said, beginning climb up the side of the ship...before a large, blade-like hook attached to a long chain came out of the forest surrounding the clearing where the Dread-Yacht was. Yelling out in surprise, Rubble Rouser was quickly pulled into the forest, which he was ejected back out of mere moments after a small explosion was heard. As soon the Skylanders up on the deck saw the blackened and smoking form of the rock monster landing in the snow, they all jumped down to the ground, assuming their respective battle stances along with Bouncer.
Out of the trees where the hook had come from emerged a tall, humanoid figure with a black cloak that covered the person's whole body. On the figure's right arm was the blade-like hook that the others had seen earlier, but even as the others watched, the hook seemed to disappear into the sleeve of the cloak. As the figure walked into the clearing, the Skylanders and Colin could see a pair of long, crystal horns that had speared themselves through the top of the hood.
Seeing his fellow Cloudbreaker lying on the ground in a smoking heap, Freeze Blade was filled with rage at this strange enemy who dared to attack the Skylanders. An ice chakram forming in his hand, Freeze Blade rushed forward at the cloaked figure. Raising his arm up as he skated across the snow, he brought his weapon down on the stranger's head, but before he could make contact with the hood, the cloaked stranger brought their right hand, which strangely didn't have the hook anymore, up so quickly that Freeze Blade couldn't even see it and caught the ice cat's wrist.
"Pathetic," a voice, male by the sounds of it, said from beneath the stranger's hood. "I thought the rest of the Skylanders would be a greater challenge. But apparently, the Cloudbreakers aren't any better than the Trap Team. Wouldn't you agree, Ephialtes?"
At that moment, a small, gargoyle-like creature with black scales, horns, and claws and beady red eyes came out of the trees behind the cloaked stranger. "Oh yes, master Cazador," the creature, apparently Ephialtes, said. "These 'protectors of Skylands' don't hold a candle to your greatness master Cazador."
"Quit sucking up, Ephialtes," Cazador said, kicking the small creature in the head.
"Yes master Cazador," Ephialtes replied, rubbing his small black head.
"Hey, idiot!" Freeze Blade yelled, bringing his other hand up, an ice chakram forming in it as he spoke. "You might want to pay attention!" Then he brought down the weapon on Cazador's head, creating a tear in his hood and causing him to release his grip on Freeze Blade.
"Hmm," Cazador said. "Maybe you will give me some fun."
"Oh, we'll give you some fun," a voice behind Cazador said. "In the form of us beating you into a pile of mashed potatoes."
"Guessing from that horrible joke and the vegetable reference, you must be Food Fight," Cazador stated, turning around to see the little plant creature holding his veggie cannon at him. "And I'm also guessing that if you are behind me, then Bouncer must be to your right, Star Strike to your left, and Roller Brawl is directly above me."
Food Fight narrowed his eyes at the crystal-horned foe in front of him. "How do you know all of our names?" Food Fight suspiciously asked Cazador, recalling the many times when an enemy could never remember any of the Skylanders names and simply referred to any of them as 'Skylander'.
"How I know is not of importance," Cazador replied to the veggie warrior's question.
"Well, even if you won't tell us," Star Strike said, preparing to fire a star shard. "We can easily get the information out of you once you're sent to Cloudcracker Prison."
For some reason, Cazador found that statement funny, as laughter could be heard from beneath his hood.
"What's so funny?" Bouncer wondered as he got ready to fire several shoulder rockets.
"You'll find out soon enough," Cazador said mysteriously. "So what are my options here from your perspective?"
"Surrender, be forcefully captured, or die," Freeze Blade said, the beginnings of an ice shard forming in front of him.
"I see," Cazador stated as he moved his hand up to his hood and grabbed the rim, a movement Food Fight couldn't help but wonder what the point of was. "I'm afraid none of those are going to work for me."
"Forcefully captured it is then," Food Fight said as all four Skylanders simultaneously fired their respective attacks at the cloaked figure before them, raising a cloud of dust and snow in the process. At the sight of this, a smile began to grow on his face. This facial expression turned to one of surprise as the dust began to clear, and then to complete and utter shock when he saw that all that was where Cazador had stood just a moment before was the tattered remains of his cloak. Cazador was gone, and Food Fight couldn't think of where he was...until he heard Bouncer cry out in surprise.
Looking over, everybody saw several long vines with small, green orbs attached to them were wrapping themselves around Bouncer's body, arms, and single wheel. Suddenly, before any of them could react, the orbs on the vines exploded, releasing a cloud of poisonous-looking gas and causing Bouncer to fall over on the ground. While Bouncer looked mostly intact, the explosion must have reached some of the wiring inside the former Roboto Ball player's body because he wasn't getting up.
A moment later, a figure jumped out of the ground next to the fallen robot, which the Skylanders realized was Cazador from the crystal horns atop his head, which they noticed had several orange patches on them, which were quickly fading away to replaced by the horns original black color. Without the cloak, everybody could see that Cazador was actually quite skinny and had a rather lean build, despite his ability to hold Freeze Blade's entire arm with just one hand. His small frame was covered by a simple black vest and slacks. His body was deathly pale, except for the claws on his hands and talon-like feet, which were made of the same black crystal as his horns. Besides his horns, Cazador's head also held a mop of greasy, black hair which fell down almost to his shoulders and a pair of long, elf-like ears. The strangest thing about him however were his eyes, which kept changing from one eye color to another. The Skylanders also noticed the same kind of vines that had attacked Bouncer were growing on Cazador's back, but even as they watched, the vines withered away and turned to dust, the ashes falling down on the ground and blackening the snow.
"You've made three major mistakes so far," Cazador said, holding up a finger as he mentioned each mistake. "Mistake number one; you didn't stop to think that I might have had the ability to dig underground, which is why I went after Rubble Rouser first. Mistake number two; you underestimated me, believing that I was just another arrogant, vain enemy that you face against on a daily basis, not even thinking for a moment that I could have been perfectly capable of taking on all of you. And mistake number three; none of you asked yourself where you had seen the crystal that my horns were made of before."
Food Fight stood with a confused look, until he realized that Cazador was right; he had seen crystal like that before, but he couldn't remember where. Not only that, but the vines and hook that Cazador had somehow utilized also struck a cord in Food Fight's memory. Something about an island of talking stone heads and then later a really rainy group of islands, and earlier, Cazador had mentioned something about...then it hit him. Food Fight remembered seeing those same vines used by a different enemy, and the same thing was true with the hook Cazador had used. As for the horns, Food Fight knew what very well what that crystal was. As hard as it is to believe, Food Fight thought to himself. Those horns...are made of Traptanium.
OOOOOOOO
Everybody stood in awkward silence as they stared at Spee D. Mon, until Angela broke the silence.
"Well that's the stupidest name I've ever heard in my life," she said.
Without looking over at her, Spee pointed his pistol above Angela's head and fired, sending a small black projectile that seemed to be made of condensed wind at the cliff above Angela's head. This caused a large portion of snow to drop on Angela's head, once again burying her.
"As I was saying," Spee D. Mon continued, pointing his gun back at Spark. "I will give you a quick, mostly painless death. Is that understood?"
"There's no way in hell that's going to work for me," Spark said, getting ready to launch another fireball at his opponent. "So I've got a different proposal for you. You tell us where my sister is, go back to where you came from, and we won't totally destroy you. It's five against one. You've got no chance."
The metal armed Demon Lord sighed. "If I had a gold coin for every time I heard someone say that, I'd be able to buy the entire Cloudbreak Islands. Alright, let's just get this over with. I'm bored with this already." Before anyone could react, Spee D. Mon's metal arm headed straight to Spark in a silver blur, extending to impossible lengths. Just before it could hit Spark however, an elf that Spark didn't recognize jumped in front of him out of nowhere and grabbed the metal hand, creating a small gouge in the snow with his feet before stopping completely.
Staring in apparent shock at the strange elf that had appeared, Spee D. Mon glared at him before firing two dark air bullets at the elf. Reacting quickly, the elf moved the metal arm he was holding in front of the projectiles, holes appearing in the metal surface as they were stopped. Yelling in pain despite the hand being seemingly artificial, the Demon Lord pulled his metal arm back to it's original position as he uttered a string of curse words.
"Who the fuck are you?" Spee D. Mon snarled, rubbing his hand where the bullets had hit him.
"Speak-language, please," the elf said, pulling the feather out of his ponytail as he stepped forward. "As for my name-title, I am Aquillo. And you are trespassing on my home-place."
"You son of a bitch," Spee hissed through his mask. "Step aside. I have a mission to accomplish."
"If you hope-wish to murder-kill this dragon," Aquillo stated in a grim voice, spinning the feather in his hand, which began to grow longer and change shape, until it became a long, light-blue spear with a feather shaped blade on either side of the shaft. "You will have to get past-through me."
"Man, this day is full of surprises," Infernia said to herself behind Triton, Shock, Lefa, and Quartzia, having just floated out of the woods after Aquillo.
"Very well," Spee D. Mon growled in a low, menacing tone as he got ready to pounce. "I will destroy you first."
OOOOOOOO
A cloaked figure stood before a light-blue, silver, gray, and black vortex in the middle of a dark temple-like room lined on either side by black columns. Torches held up by several stands placed between the columns provided light to the dim room, showing four figures at one end of the room standing in front an enormous door that seemed to lead outside judging from the white light coming through the cracks. At the opposite of the room, ten cages, three of which were occupied, hung over a dark pit that seemed to go on forever.
The figure in the middle of the room stood perfectly still in front of the vortex, as though they were waiting for something. They didn't have to wait long however, as a the vortex suddenly shifted as a large claw stretched through the portal, grasping at the air. This was followed by an arm, then an elbow, shoulder, and many other body parts until a huge beast stood before the cloaked figure. The creature had a very draconic appearance, with a brown scaled body, a pair of yellowed horns jutting out of it's forehead, draconic legs, bat-like wings, and large clawed hands. However, it walked on two legs, lacked a tail and chest-plates that dragons usually have, and possessed thumbs and fangs that were more vampire-like than a dragon's. Despite being far taller than the cloaked figure before it, the beast bowed before them, getting down on one knee and putting it's fist on the ground. Forty-nine more nearly identical beasts followed their companion out of the portal, and, like the beast before them, bowed before the figure before the portal shrank and disappeared.
"Welcome my allies," the cloaked figure greeted the creatures in front of him. "My name is Paleo, and I am your master, therefore you must follow my instructions. You must also follow the orders of the four you see behind me. Now rise for your orders."
"Yes master Paleo," all of the creatures said simultaneously as they got up. "What are your orders, master Paleo?"
"You, you, you, and you," Paleo said as he pointed at four different beasts, who lined up in front of their master. "You four will be my personal guard. Unless I give permission, you are not to allow anyone within four feet of me. Is that clear?"
"Yes master Paleo," the four beasts replied.
"Good," Paleo said, his cloak sweeping across the floor as he turned to the other forty-six creatures. "The rest of you will guard the temple. If you see anyone, you are to report it to me. Understood?"
"Yes master Paleo," the rest of the creatures replied.
"Also, if one of my four companions order you to assist them, then you are to follow their orders," Paleo added
"Yes master Paleo," the beasts replied almost instantly.
"Dismissed," Paleo said, confident that the creatures would do their jobs competently if not completely correctly. As he walked over to the door at the end of the room, the four creatures he had ordered to be his personal guards followed him. Stopping in front of the doors, Paleo looked over at the other four figures. Each of them wore a black cloak and a mask, the one at the far left wearing a lion mask, the one to the left wearing a mask shaped like the front of a Spartan helmet, the one on the right wearing a mask shaped like a vulture, and the one on the far right wearing a skull mask.
Turning to the figure with the lion mask, Paleo said, "Conquest, I want you to take six of the gallu and build a teleport pad to the Southern Water Dragon Kingdom. My spies have confirmed that the location of the Demon Lord of the Undead element is located there."
The lion-masked figure nodded. "How will I wake him though?"
At this, Paleo seemed to grin under the hood of his cloak. "Set up the teleport pad so that eight people will be able to enter it. I will send Cazador with you and the six galla so that you he can use his powers to awaken the Demon Lord."
"You put far too much trust in that artificial demon if you ask me," the figure with the skull mask said. "He's not even one of the Ten Demon Lords, yet ever since you sent him to Cloudcracker Prison, his power is equal to that of-"
His sentence was cut short when Paleo grabbed his throat and rammed the skull masked figure against the door. "If you ever mention that place again," Paleo growled, his voice quivering with anger, pain, and remorse. "I will send you back to the void I found you and the rest of the Horsemen in, Death. Is that clear?"
Death hurriedly nodded, and Paleo let him go, getting in his face. "I put faith in those who do their job. Your job is not to patronize my choice of allies. Cazador did his job better than I had ever expected him to, and that is why I believe he can accomplish other, more difficult tasks. If he can not accomplish a task, he will be punished severely with the required amount of pain he deserves, but until then, I will put my faith in him. And if he and everyone else does their tasks correctly, then I will have my revenge on the Skylanders, and soon, all of Skylands will be mine!"
Three-cheers for my longest chapter ever! And a three-cheers for my return! Sorry for keeping you all waiting. I had a lot of stuff going on, but consider this extra long chapter as an apology. I promise that in the future, I'll keep these things as consistent as I possibly can, but for now, I'm glad I've got this out of the was. But enough about that. Merry Christmas everyone, and Happy Late Birthday to Undead Prowess and Samjax! Keep being awesome, and I can't wait for the second part of Darkest Hour, Prowess. Anybody who's reading this, make sure to read some of Undead Prowess and Samjax's stories if you haven't already. They are some awesome authors, no lie.
"If you're done acting like a commercial speaker, we're almost out of time, so you might want to wrap this up."
Alright, Foaly. Remember to look out for my next chapter:
Elves vs. Demons
And remember that reviews are like food to me. The more I get, the more energy I have to write the next chapter. ;)
I'll see you faithful readers next time, and until then, Stay Magical and Merry Christmas!
EDIT: I accidentally said that Conquest's mask was that of an eagle at one point. It's actually a lion's mask, so I'm sorry if I got anyone confused.