Chapter 28: The One Way Walls
Over the walls of Archana they flew. Great beasts, wyverns. Larger than horses smaller than true dragons. The men aboard them bearing the crest of Dol and displaying vigor for battle. The unit, larger than a small retinue yet slightly smaller than a platoon or true full army. Yet, with beasts this size the number present would prove the victor in many a battle against larger numerical foes.
"My word this place is untouched. The rumors from the coastal trader was true, this land, is nearly virgin." The leader of the riders spoke as he observed the serenity of the lands now being sullied by the riders. The men touched down from the skies creating the first bends in the grasses of the fields.
"What is that?" A large figure in the shape of a large beast is seen running quick to the south trying to not be seen by the wyverns. Guards up men. This is a strange place.
"Scipio, sir, there is a building in the distance where that animal is running toward. Should we pursue?"
"This is a great nation known by all of the world, with a grand wall and this is all that is visible to us? Let us proceed slow and with caution, none of us and our maps have any experience with this place. We must be cautious." They examined the plains of sweeping grass and calm winds that seems all to have been disturbed by the arrival of the men and their mounts. Scipio knew that his mission here was an interesting one as no one in the lands of Dol had any true knowledge of the country, and yet they were sent in pursuit of myth and legend and fact finding for perhaps a later conquest.
"This might be an easier place to conquer than first thought. There is no one here." The riders were confident, when in fact the wind itself was warning them of their impending demise. This was sacred ground on which they were unwelcomed. They stood on land that wished for no outside influence. Their lives were already forfeit.
The wyverns grew restless and less cooperative with the passing of minutes as the air became somehow thicker, as if the land was telling the men of Dol their future status. Their leader signaled for the formation to tighten as they advanced in deeper away from the one landmark of the realm. With each step the beasts whinnied and moaned, crying to their master's that the area ahead was too much for them to handle.
"Scipio, ahead. What is that? Near that lone building." A rider called as they came in view of the keep Archon. As they stared the small near the building became slightly larger and larger as the moments passed. The company halted as they took in the view and created a defensive position.
"This could be a treating party, or this could be a trap. Take position and do not let your guard down." The leader was still cautious while the senses told him there was no danger in these lands, he knew this was still a nation unto itself. He could not escape this feeling as though he were a small fish who had walked into the open mouth of a leviathan. The blurs began to take shape as they approached in closer.
…..
Scythe and Reto were focused, calm and yet furious. The world around seemed to have in the mostly peaceful millennia forgotten the legends, the histories of their efforts, and the power they held with their hands. The two saw the core of mounted flyers for what it was, a raiding party seeking to take easy riches or power from the isolated and hallowed lands of Anya. That alone earned all present a death. Would the death be good or sustained pain absent purpose? Scythe had his wishes and imagination as the two approached the cluster. They were easy to find, the wind betrayed every movement of the introducers. While they were mostly silent in their movements and touching of the land, peaceful in their gait and calm in their general respect toward the land. This was the holy land of Archana, undefiled and empty of mankind's influence, every noise or touch upon the ground, or sweep of the grass echoed over the plains to those who knew the language of the weeds. And with the disturbance of the ground, came forward the retribution. Scythe and Reto.
Now plainly in clear view of the wyvern core, the men could see there was no white flag, and so they tightened harder in their defensive.
"Vagabonds of this land. We are representatives of the Bruin empire."
"An empire you say. Sounds like news to my ears. The only two true nations on this realm are Archana and Yannis." Scythe retorted with a light jest to the rider.
"Bruin is an empire of force that will consume all of Wiera including this empty wasteland of nothing. Bring us to your king and we shall perhaps spare you and your squire for your insolence." Scipio was not amused by the rushed speech of the cloaked swordsman. The land of Archana seemed absent any means of note and while they were told to take anything of power or recruit any men of renown they came across and kill all others the rider was growing angry with the lack of awe the land was yielding from a visible power.
"My insolence. Oh dear boy, do you know where you are?"
"Boy? I am clearly your senior. Stand down you cur!" Scipio unsheathed his sword and pulled back on the reins of his wyvern. The beast rose to its hind legs to display the sheer size of the animal in comparison to the men below. Yet the wyvern would not growl, as it made eye contact with Scythe and Reto the beast whimpered and cowered in its posture, following Scipio's wishes yet not being anywhere as notably intimidating as desired. "What is wrong with these beasts, they are acting as though we are charging them into a Sea, or a waterfall, or a mass of men beyond count?"
"You are on the land of Archana. You have defiled the holy lands of Queen Anya. I as regent king sentence you to death, your bodies will fertilize this field and bring forth trees and a forest to memorialize your sin." Reto spoke with a booming power that seemed to echo back from the walls of the nation. The riders looked back and noticed a sound vibrating across the surface of the walls almost as if a curse or spell had been activated by the commands of the man before them.
"Tobias. Slay them." Scipio was growing tired of the clear defiance of the men in front of him. The land showed nothing, and yet he knew that the keep ahead if any place had anything of value in these calm empty lands it would be the lone edifice. The rider summoned to combat took position and moved to combat the two standing in opposition.
"SHUNNK!" In a quick blink all was over, as the rider called Tobias fell forward in his mount with a sword driven completely through his back pinning all the way down through the wyvern. The beast cried as the pain of the blade was felt and yet the blow was not deep enough to mortally wound it. Standing atop the back of the beast was Scythe holding the blade as he looked onward viewing the remaining riders. The wyvern would not stop wailing as the coming moment's passed with Scythe and Reto remaining calm and focused.
"Beg pardon beast." Sycthe pulled the sword from the rider's back, unpinning the rider from the wyvern. The beast flung his head skyward and flapped its wings in terror as it sought to free itself of the area. Yet scythe was not a merciful one. He twirled his sword through, cleaving with the swift force of the blade the head of the wyvern from the body. The head thunders as it touched the ground of the land. The quiet plains echo this foreign sound so much that the sobriety of the moment shocks all the men of Dol and their beasts as they realize a monster perhaps beyond them stands at the ready. Seeking their demise. The men tighten their grips on reigns and weapons. Unsure of the next action before them.
"MONSTER!" Scipio calls to the swordsman who in this moment wicks his blade clean and dismounts the headless body of the wyvern.
"Reto, what say you?" scythe calls as he pays no mind to the words of the rider.
"I count 45."
"You mean 44." He says this with a smile as another rider falls in that instant from his beast to death. Scipio and the other men of dol look over, assuming perhaps the man died of a shock, when the reality was a delayed separation of a slashing attack that only now split the so gently and swiftly parted flesh. Blood flowed, as though a geyser from the corpse on the ground.
"WHAT ARE YOU DEMON?" The leader holds his reigns tight as several of the wyverns seek to take off and fly away with haste. "HOLD MEN!" He says with a panic and uncertainty in his eyes, an emotion foreign to him. Screams and cries from men and beast alike fill the calm and otherwise silent lands.
"Fine. I'll take 22 and you can take 22." Reto laughs at his friend, ignoring the cries of the Bruin men and beasts.
"Oh no my friend, I cannot allow the Regent king of Archana to do the heavy lifting." Scythe smiles as Reto darts forward. He is nowhere the lightning flash of Scythe and yet his step is with a pace that itself imprints the soil, showing both his power and pushing ability. Scipio signals the men to defend themselves as several pull back on their wyverns to allow the great fell beasts to attack at the men. Reto slams his shield quickly into the skull of a wyvern, resulting in a booming gong that encompasses the land in a sonic contortion. Knocking several others off their beasts. His strength is without equal. He then pirouettes around and slams his lance through the body of the rider of that wyvern, cutting him in two as his he swung a sharp sword and not a bladed lance. The ground is scarred from the attack. Creating a rivet in the ground, one that swallowed the decimated corpse of that rider. The beasts that freed themselves of their rider take to the sky and fly quickly back north seeking refuge over the wall. Scipio notices the disarray before him as the two men fight with a prowess beyond anything he imagined and all with what seemed meager effort on their part.
"What is this? Intel quickly?" Scipio demanded of his page.
"Perhaps the legends are real?"
"PLEASE HALT!" the voice carried its weight as the two men quelled their efforts of ruthless surgical striking and barbaric cratering. "Please at least explain who you are? I do not understand? Are you a god? Should we worship at your alter? Could lord Chile Bruin offer you wealth for aiding his cause?" All these questions flooded from the desperate mouth of the wyvern commander, who was seeing firsthand his own weakness in the handling of the situation before him. He is scared as the terror was setting in and taking residence on his heart.
"AHHHHHH!" Behind them the wyverns free of their rider collide with the wall as they attempt to flee.
"But they were high enough to scale it?" Called another of the men.
"You attack these lands seeking power and influence yet, know nothing. The walls have a curse or divine spell upon them. To be absent the divine, these walls are purely one way portals. They will rise higher and higher to halt being, beast or man. Once across the only way to leave again is by the coast."
"DAMN!" Scipio and the others grunt as they could see the magic work with their own eyes before them. The wyverns crash against walls that only a moment prior were lower than the beast. They cry as they fall to the ground, only to recollect themselves and seek freedom with ever more panic in their body language and voice.
"Today you fight something beyond your scope of limited reality. Your legends call me Scythe."
"And I am Regent King of Archana, Reto. Your lives belong to the ground, a fertilizer for the holy lands before you."
Scipio and the others knew these two names, yet there were merely bed time stories for children. No one thought these being truly existed. In frustration several of the riders rushed Reto and lodged a flurry of attack from multiple directions upon the armored knight. Clanging sounds crashed upon the air as the attacks prove too slow as the speed of his shield is unmatched by their efforts. He shifts to parry, then shifts to receive another blow incoming, then to turn 180 degrees to without effort redirect another attack onto the next beast beside him. The man grows restless in the futility of the attacks. He shoves his lance through the skull of one wyvern, so deep that it falls over backwards crushing the mounted man beneath it. He releases his grip on the lance to then take both hands on his shield. He jumps into the air high and slams the shield vertically downward into the ground pinning under it the head of another wyvern severing it clean and crushing it as the ground gives way to the impact of the massive heavy shield. He then releases it and walks up the spine of the beast to the rider who is desperately in a frenzy trying to loose himself from the saddle locks. The man is frantic as the legend approaches, unarmed and yet still as imposing as ever. The rider cannot loose himself, he grabs his axe and swings it at Reto. The seraphim catches the blade head with his hand, it fails to cut the glove leather and produce any damage. Reto then tugs on the axe, pulling it from the man's hand as the impending doom towers above the trapped man of dol.
"Duck Tommy!" A second rider flies straight at the man with his wyvern's mouth open ready to envelope the titan. "BAMMM!" Reto with hands bare responds and punches a hole through the back of the wyvern's neck as he tries to bite down on the king. The guts from the hole spray onto the shocked rider who sought to save his friend. He relieves himself in terror and begins hyperventilating as Reto turns his attention back to the other man. The pinned rider grabs a knife from his side and shoves it at the legend. The knife tip break upon his armor, and with it the last small belief of possible escape from this hell. Reto grabs the man by his lower jawline and rips it clean out of the skull through the skin. The rider falls forward and panics as his face is torn asunder and his life is draining quickly. Reto then hurls the jawbone through the chest hole of the wyvern corpse still propped upon him and connects it to the face of the would be savior. The jawbone imbeds itself in his skull as though it were a sharpened blade. Death has befallen both. Reto pushes the dead wyvern off of himself before he retrieves his shield and lance.
Meanwhile Scythe had continued his dancing blade work as only the black of his cloak was able to be caught by the eyes of the scared men huddled to their deaths. He cleaves and with it judges the souls before him to damnation. They provide no contest or challenge as each falls with elegant and yet unseen technique. Scythe is now moving far more efficiently than when he first awoke to the sounds on Remnant Isle. It was as though the sparring with Reto ignited the long dormant passion for blood that lay within him, that made him the cherubim of Kaya all those years back. As he slashes and Reto crashes the remaining men he is taken mentally back 1000 years to the days when Kaya found him….
She was the goddess, and beautiful in any way a man could imagine. Skin, flawless, scent, divine. Nothing was wrong or diminished or off with her. Scythe was intoxicated as she stood before the young angry mercenary who just survived his company's betrayal and supposed execution. She saw him through the wounds, and heavy breathing as a feral animal that she could unleash upon her enemies. She took him in, cleaned him up. Made love to him over and over, and gave him her blood to drink to grant Scythe his immortality. All this was strange to the man, and yet, a mercenary without a company, without name or prestige. He was okay to simply exist in her space and adore this goddess. For while most men had a desire to know what they consider to be such a woman….she was exactly that. As things progressed she called for death and he swiftly with ever growing ability delivered it as though he were a shadow gliding through the light. She then took him to the volcano on Remnant Isle where they summoned the sword which now he kept beneath his cloak, Darkness. This was the legacy of the one they called Scythe, bloody and chaotic in service to a goddess. It was a story he shared so many similar points with to his comrade, Reto.
The swordsman returns his mind from the past as he continues what his subconscious engaged in, cutting and slashing without desire for quarter. Reto a few paces over was punching a man to his death after snapping his drake's neck. Reto then grabs a spear from the side of the fallen soldier and hurls it as a javelin all the wall back to the wall into the mouth and through the skull of a drake futility seeking to depart. The beast cries as best its muffled mouth can as it collapses to the ground crushing another rider and beast below with its impact.
Scipio is undone. The surrounding company has withered with the moments and so has his courage. He sees no way out. "Sir what do we do?" One of the two remaining uncontested or bloody next to him asks. Scipio gives no reply and shoves his sword through his own chest. His eyes well up with tears and pull as he tenses and puckers for air. He then shakes violently as he attempts to move the blade along his chest. Yet, the wound itself is sufficient to end the man. In the ensuing moments the rider falls from the back of the beast. Scythe sees the result and sighs.
"Such a coward." He says as he move to release the final two men from the world of the living. The remaining men and beast prove even less a threat as fear paralyzes them, and the doorway to death flings open for them all.
Reto and Scythe stand calm as the final death of both beast and rider takes hold and the vibrating of the sounds along the wall subside. Both exhale as though they are releasing what remaining feral emotion and rage rests in their chests. Soon the land calms as the wind and walls cease to echo the final cries and murmurs of the fallen. A few faint whispering gasps still exist as they beg and quietly fall further until the wounds finish the job. The only beasts left on these plains are the legends themselves. Content with the end result, Scythe sheathes his blade once again.
"They really are seeking power, and seeking something that I believe only the inner circle understands." Reto says as he releases his shield from the ground.
"I think you're right. How or what they seek I do not know, but if they are sending this experienced and expensive corp to their unknown demise, then something is fishy."
"Perhaps we need to pay this Chile Bruin of Dol a visit and stop his quest ourselves."
"You know Reto I was just about to say that exact idea. The two smile as the spoils on the ground, the blood, the bodies, and the flesh of the wyverns, pollute the ground and yet, the ground accepts the offering as if the ground is alive and conscious to rid itself of the waste. It isn't a rapid action, but the grass with the aid of the wind envelopes over the bodies, hiding from a defiling view to any who would gazes on the holy plains. The two legends move to the wall and bound to the top in a leap. They stand unaffected by the magic of the wall, being immortal and both bearing the blood of Kaya in their veins.
The ground beneath them forgets their footsteps as the whisper of the wind waves the grass back into place, hiding their actions. Scythe and Reto gaze from atop the wall, Scythe is looking forward, in anticipation of culling the trouble from the realm spearheaded by the efforts of the lord Chile Bruin, and Reto is gazing back along the holy lands of Anya, remembering his fallen daughter and a tear drops from his eyes as he is upset to see bloodshed have to occur in his daughter's lands.
Scythe sees his friend and places a hand on his friend's shoulder. "It had to happen and we were swift. They invaded, we did not bring them." Scythe repeats a second time to let the message truly sink in for the man.
"I believe you, and I know this to be true and yet my soul feels crushed knowing that for the first time in a great while I had to spill blood inside these walls."
"Then let us go this aspiring conqueror and spill his to stop the growing chaos in this world." Scythe drew focus back to the present and their future. It had been a long time since his life felt like it had a mission or a purpose. He was strangely excited but kept a visible reserve. Reto cared not for a mission or purpose. He simply enjoy preserving the sanctuary. But he knew this was important for the future preservation of Archana.
"The sent men of war into Anya's fields. This house of Bruin will answer in their lifeblood." The wind caressed them both as they stood ready atop the black obsidian walls.