Chapter Twelve
Shattered Magic
The heroes slumped onto the stairs, all of them soaked through by the elementals water. Klash summoned his fire totem to help dry off the team before they all froze.
'Anyone else think it's getting colder?' Klash asked allowed. 'No? Just me then…' The rest of the group busied themselves preparing their gear.
Marsh looked around at the group, and then focused on his runeblade. The runes shone bright blue down the length of the blade. He, like the others of the group could feel it, all these battles within the Violet hold were nothing compared to what was coming for them now. The very air tingled in anticipation of their next encounter.
Marsh stood, his senses alert, he could feel eyes upon him. Walking to the bottom of the stairs he prepared himself. The rest of the group watched him carefully; they too could feel eyes upon them. Slowly they readied themselves and moved into position around Marsh.
Marsh's eyes scanned the area looking for the threat he knew was coming, a glimmer of blue caught his eye as he looked up. A blue flash fell from above and landed in the centre of the room. The thing began to rise from the floor; it appeared to be a High elf, dressed in azure blue. The elf stared at the group.
'A valiant defense heroes. 'She said to them. 'But this city must be razed. I will fulfill Malygos' wishes myself!' She then began to shimmer and shift, a blue light burst from her, growing brighter and brighter. The heroes were forced to cover their eyes from the light, when they turned back a fully grown blue dragon stood before them, its intelligent eyes inspecting them.
'We finish this now, champions of the Kirin Tor!' It roared, as it stepped toward the group.
The room boomed. The dragon's magic clashed against Marsh's runeblade, the magical discharge from the blows echoes around the chamber.
Marsh would have surely been overpowered already by the dragon's onslaught if not for Bella constantly renewing his energy, allowing him to remain un-fatigued after using up so much of his power.
Klash had moved behind the dragon to strike at its foreleg. He struck the beast with his elemental empowered weapon; scales tore from the dragons hide.
Roaring the dragon swept its tail, catching Klash full in the stomach and sent him flying into Naralissa who had had the same idea of taking the beast from behind.
'The world has forgotten what true magic is!' The dragon roared. 'Let this be a reminder!' In an instant the dragon had teleport the heroes in front of her. The heroes staggered, as they tried to make sense of their new location. This was all the hesitation that the dragon needed, frozen ice rained down on them. Shielding themselves as best they could the group scattered.
Bella slipped and the blue took the chance to strike, jaws wide, she lunged toward Bella, mere inches from her prey the dragon was rocked by an explosion to the side of the head. Bella gasped, turning she watched as their leader prepared another explosive arrow. How he had managed to avoid being teleported with the rest of the group Bella didn't know, but she took this chance to escape from the dragon.
'Who among you can withstand my power?' The best roared. From her maw arcane energy burst forth and consumed all within its path.
Marsh turned as he ran from the blizzard. He watched as the beast unleashed a torrent of arcane energy from its mouth. His eyes grew wide as he watched the torrent consume their leader.
'ARKCARD…!' He screamed. His vision fixed on the spot where he had last seen him, now the area was consumed in crackling arcane energy.
A black rage descended upon Marsh, the runes upon his blade burned green as his poured unholy energy into it. He charged toward the beast, swinging his blade down across the dragons face. Scales ripped from the dragons hide, the magical protection giving way to the unholy energies within the blade as it sank into the flesh. The beast roared, tearing its head back away from the attack. Brining its foreleg forward it swiped at marsh, knocking him to the floor, but he felt nothing, his body hardened by unholy frost. Picking himself up he charged forward once more, slashing at the beast, tearing at the scales as it tried to strike him with its claws.
Klash and Naralissa both watched, as Marsh tore into the dragon, unholy energies surrounded him as he sent bolts of the energy into the dragon, beating against its magical protection. They marveled at the power the Death knight wielded. While in his rage they dared not engage the beast less they be caught in one of the attacks.
The dragon slowly regained some of its balance, as it recovered from the blow to its head. Once more it sucked in the arcane energy around it and prepared to unleash it upon Marsh, to bring a halt to his unholy rage.
Marsh knew what the dragon planned and prepared, calling upon his unholy protection he summoned a ant-magic shell around himself, the green orb surrounded him just as the dragon unleashed another torrent of raw arcane power upon him. Forced onto the defensive Marsh had to use all of his energy to keep the field from collapsing. He could feel the field failing, he fell to one knee with the effort, knowing that he would not survive the magic unleashed upon him if it failed. He looked up into the eyes of the dragon; his hatred for it was mirrored within its eyes. He strained against the effort, he gasped as his power was just about to give out. He closed his eyes as he strained to maintain the shell as the arcane energies tried to consume it.
Then the torrent stopped. Marsh opened his eyes, looking toward the beast. Its eyes glazed over, its life fluids flowed to the floor. The area by its head where Marsh had struck now showed a gaping hole. The beasts rocked and feel to the floor, dead. Marsh looked to where Klash and Naralissa stood.
'What…?' Was all he could manager before Klash pointed toward the stairs, a huge smile on his face. There stood their leader, Arkcard, supported by Bella. Marsh collapsed backward relief spread through his body.
'Don't you every scare me like that again.' He breathed as he lay on his back, he was all but spent after using so much power.
'Sorry about that, Bella really did save my life.' With Bella's help he lay down next to Marsh, they both burst into giggles.
'As if you allowed that over grown lizard to cough on you.' Marsh giggled, hitting Arkcard on the side with his hand.
'It's not my fault you couldn't hold the beasts attention.' He chided as he hit Marsh back.
'What was that anyway? What killed the beast?'
'Ah, I have been working on this new technique, I call it the 'Kill shot' fitting name don't you think?' Marsh just grinned.
'Well if you two reckless fools are quite finished what are we going to do now?' Klash called over as he and Naralissa walked to join them.
Marsh and Arkcard looked around the room. Pools of water were everywhere, with fallen Dragonspawn littering the place. The demon armor lay on the floor to their right, the revenants armor behind them, and to their left lay the blue dragon.
'Well I'm not cleaning this up.' Marsh said 'You do it, you brought us here.'
'Me? Hell no, I have far more important things to do.'
'Well I guess this leaves only one option then Ark.' Marsh said using Arkcard's shortened name. He pulled a small stone from his pocket; the rest of the group did likewise.
'Well you know where I will be if you need me Ark.'
'Till next time Marsh, and thank you all for coming'
Bella, Naralissa, and Klash nodded.
'Till next we meet.'
'May the light watch over you.'
'Hay guys want to help in Molte…'
'No!' The heroes laughed as they vanished in a burst of green light.
Klash signed. He then too vanished.
The chamber within the Violet hold lay silent; the sounds of the battles that had raged within had long been consumed by the rock. The only witnesses to the battle where trapped prisoners within.