Events post #331: The Second War of Night, Part XXIII: Judged and Found Wanting

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9/6/2022 at 1:10
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The Second War of Night, Part XXIII: Judged and Found Wanting

As Enorian busily prepared themselves for the coming siege, Rhulin Glintspear continued his efforts on repairing the Lance of the Gods. Having taken advice from Exarch Berrad on how to more accurately direct the flames, the Dwarf, perpetually wrenched from his hopes of retirement, toiled night and day with no small measure of irritation. His burdens would be heightened as the Maelstrom requested of him a mighty battering ram with which to properly siege the General's camp. Rhulin, ever the selfless Engineer, reluctantly agreed, splitting his focus between the two tasks.

~ ~ ~

On an otherwise quiet day for Enorian, the peace was disturbed by a brilliant flash of fire streaking across the sky. Laughs of triumph followed, soon transforming to awkward apologies as Rhulin, having successfully mended the Lance, inadvertently turned its fire on a pair of guards near the Ascendril Lighthouse. Loudly declaring his success for the entire land to hear, he regaled the city with his triumph and assured them he would keep practising in order to improve his aim.

The month of Slyphian soon rolled around in a strange twist of coincidence, its namesake briskly calling Enorian to the Garden of Dawn in advance of the coming siege. While the citizens gathered, Rhulin's voice called out, directing a group of his labourers to carry the massive battering ram he had made out into the camp. Clad in a klaio bronze cuirass with Their trident in hand, Slyphe gave a rousing speech, Their usual whimsy replaced by a far more sombre demeanour. The Changing God spoke of fate, and the inevitable defeat that awaited the shadowspawn by their hands. Bellowing reminders that they were the bringers of change, the fate that the Shadow feared, They gave the order to march and took leave for the war camp, Enorian hastily following in tow.

So it was that, under the command of Vanguard Sryaen and Heralds Rasani, Kalena, Benedicto, and Xavin, Enorian strode forth to battle, the visages of Adalric, Annerissa, Eliadon, Emhyra, Enamari, Melantha, Merek, Myrnma, Nimiphi, Orunmila, Rhesk, Roux, Undirnath and Xenaden visible amidst the congregation. As they reached the Djinn's commandpost, Exarch Saebi joined the fray, twin-bladed manta gripped tightly in her hands. Rhulin's immense battering ram laid before them, spanning the whole length of the camp, and the siege began.

Heaving with all their strength, they drove the ram relentlessly into the barricade, sundering wood and metal while shadowspawn leapt down from above to harry them. Interspersing their efforts with the ram with rows of fusebombs, Xavin worked his fingers to the bone, unspooling wire and carefully activating the explosives while Benedicto organised efforts with the siege weapon. Salvos of arrows flew from atop the barricade to stymie the attackers again and again, until the Maelstrom brought forth a sea-green dome over the area, shielding them from the projectiles. In short order they soon found a rhythm, alternating between explosives and direct siege, wave after wave of shadowspawn filing out to stop them. Exarch Saebi fought with zeal and passion, cutting them down, while the Maelstrom lent Their own aid, felling several with Their trident and drowning others in cerulean waves of Divine water.

As smoke began to rise from the heart of the Pash Valley, the clang of metal against metal bespeaking the clamour of the protracted siege, the barricade shuddered, straining weakly against the strength of the combined assault. In a groan of metal and stone and ropes it finally surrendered, collapsing on itself with a thunderous crash. Cries of elation came from Enorian as they felled what remained of the shadowspawn and pressed further into the camp. Their joy was short lived.

Some twenty four divisions of Shadowbound soldiers began to mobilise, shaking the ground with their passage as they marched forth implacably from the camp of General Isalemei and turned their eyes towards Enorian, soldiers in the thousands bent on bringing about the city's fall. Following behind, shadowspawn infantry poured out of the commandpost in droves, ghasts and beasts and horrors determined to turn the siege on their General into a decisive invasion. Many froze in the panic and chaos of so many soldiers on the move, but the calming voice of Exarch Saebi cut through the fear and clamour, yelling out an order to mobilise the Djinn and Akkari soldiers at the Garden of Dawn that were now under the Hammer's command.

Enorian rallied, hosts of dauntless Akkari soldiers and armoured knights marching out to face the encroaching hordes with valour and resolve while divisions of Djinn Bellguard moved with deadly purpose toward the invaders, a bellkeeper at their head. While Enorian's Generals commanded the armies, the rest of the contingent held the line at the front, frothing hordes of shadowspawn seeming to multiply in number every time one was cut down. As the numbers swelled to near-overwhelming amounts, a series of brilliant flashes lit up the streets of Enorian, the focused flame of the Godlance incinerating the aberrations where they stood, Rhulin's raucous laughter following soon after.

The rolling plains of the Pash Valley groaned in the throes of protracted battle, the clash of armies transforming the tranquil land into a theatre of abject carnage. On the fight went, the armies meeting head to head amidst the screams of dying soldiers on both sides puncturing the air. Finally, after nearly a quarter day of engagements with death reigning supreme on all sides, the last of the shadowbound soldiers fell to the ground, routed by the combination of armoured knights, dauntless Akkari, and smouldering Bellguards.

A string of harsh curses erupted from the heart of Isalemei's commandpost, the Shadowbound Djinn making known the depths of her profound displeasure. As the dust settled, boiling waves of night-dark fire spilled out of the commandpost, viscous flames spreading like treacle and melting tar across the grass. Whipping itself into a vortex of blackened cinders and virulent smoke, Shadow Lieutenant Khoordayim took the fray at Isalemei's behest, ready to do battle. While Slyphe yelled orders to bring it down and departed further into the camp to engage the General, chaos ensued as the Lieutenant, a Shadowbound Ember turned to Ohlsana by Isalemei herself, lit up the Pash Valley in seething black flames, igniting the air with its traversal to and fro. Over forty adventurers came together to bring down Khoordayim, citizens of Duiran and Bloodloch and Spinesreach flooding into the Pash in order to lend their support.

As the Lieutenant's bell rang out with agonising peals and its flames tore violently at all who dare to strike it, eventually, slowly, it faltered. Extinguished by the combined onslaught, the smoking figure fell, its death throes a final, desperate eruption of noxious fire. Its defeated form crumbled, reduced to black ash and sooty smoke. Pillars of carmine fire shot through with streaks of oily black exploded upwards from the centre of Isalemei's camp then. Wreathed in a blistering conflagration of caliginous shadowflame, the General broke from her distant clash with the Maelstrom, sundering Their undulating aegis in a flash of calescent heat.

Isalemei turned her hate-filled gaze on Enorian, ignoring the Maelstrom Whose sanguine smirk faltered, replaced by a glare laced with impassioned resolve. Scorching the landscape with her fell passage, trailing cinders and blazing helicals followed the Shadowbound Djinn as she entered the Hammer of Dawn without fear or trepidation. In a flash she lifted herself above the Landward Gate, eyes fixated on the city sprawling below. Knives of gruesome blackfire formed at her fingertips, crackling wildly before streaking forth to scorch the streets below.

Before the fiery daggers could find purchase, the amorphous figure of the Maelstrom reformed in a rippling cascade of rainfall and salt-rimed spray, crystalline waters steaming as Slyphe absorbed the attack on Enorian with Their own body. Wincing through the wave of pain, the Changing God redoubled Their resolve, Their features girded for battle. Amused by the God's intervention, the Djinn made a sweeping gesture in the air, conjuring a swath of burning tendrils. The incandescent fronds cracked like a whip and whirled through the air like blazing bolas, surrounding the Maelstrom in a fiery helix.

Slyphe's trident moved in a blur, cutting through the shadowy ropes seeking to restrain Them. Amorphous and ever-shifting, the God, too, seemed to move with impossible agility and dexterous speed, elegantly dancing between targets as They carve through to the General proper. Sheets of heavy rainfall poured down from above at the Maelstrom's command, showering the area in a salvo of massive droplets and shards of frozen hail. They advanced on Isalemei, weapon aloft in one hand, obscuring fog gathering in the other.

Isalemei smouldered, seething with spite, with hatred, with palpable malice. The reticulated armour holding her together crumbled away and her conflagrant form swelled, looming larger. Waves of withering heat erupted from her, the fiery cascade lashing angrily at the Maelstrom and boiling the downpour to naught but wheezing steam. As God and General faced off, the cavalier laughter of Rhulin resounded from within the Ascendril Lighthouse, the long-suffering Dwarf still gleefully eradicating shadowspawn with the Lance of the Gods. Each flash of its unforgiving eye lit up the Hammer's streets for a fleeting instant, before the manifest darkness of a tainted Djinn returned in force, drowning the city beneath clouds of obscuring murk.

Across the other side of the city, a black morass of shadowspawn gathered at the Jaru Gate, the swarm determined to press further into the city. The shrieking war cry of a monstrous shadow beast inspired the rest of the rapacious horde to follow suit, and soon the air trembled under the grating chorus. Resplendent and fearless, the towering figure of Exarch Saebi strode out to meet the Shadow's second host, the first still sighted on the Landward Gate. Her jaw set in grim resolve and she drew her twin-bladed manta, holy light mantling her bulky form in a brilliant aura. Despite her insistence that she could hold the gate without aid, adventurers flocked to her side, refusing to let her fight alone.

Trails of ebon smoke wafted from the Maelstrom, Their klaio bronze cuirass scorched, blackened, and shorn of its resplendent sheen. Blisters ravaged the God's flesh, open wounds weeping from the General's merciless flames. Still They pressed on and thrusted out an upward palm, turning the freezing fog on Their hated foe. Gelid brume billowed across and around the corrupted Djinn, wintry vapour surrounding her in an eclipsing haze. Gnashing jaws formed in the murk, gnawing at fire and flesh alongside writhing tentacles thrashing violently at the enemy of all life. All the while, haunting whispers rose, the eldritch horrors of Keltundian myth and islander legend turned loose in sinister machination.

The swarms encroaching on the Jaru Gate reached a fatal level even as Saebi's manta swung like a whirlwind to cut them down one after another after another. Surrounded on all sides, she eventually fell and for a single horrifying moment, hope seemed lost. Then, in a bedazzling flare of holy light, the Exarch found herself restored to life and ready to fight on anew, revived at the behest of the Angelic Triad.

Spears of blackfire tore through the fog surrounding Isalemei, trailing wisps of ashen smoke drawn behind in their wake. Each crackled with uproarious indignation before streaking towards the Maelstrom, striking Them in the chest in a cascade of brilliant sparks. Slyphe panted in exertion but endured, all signs of sanguine nonchalance shorn from Their focused, narrow-eyed countenance. Slowed but not yet defeated, the God continued Their advance, laying into Ohlsana's General with a series of blows from Their trident. Each swing provoked a flare of enraged wildfire, fronds of black searing angrily at the Maelstrom's flesh.

Enduring the lively assault of the wounded, struggling God, the corrupted Djinn glared down at the Hammer, ruthless determination alight in the hellish pits of her incarnadine eyes. Opting to continue harrying the city and force Slyphe into unfavourable defensive positions, shadow and flame yielded effortlessly to her command, a writhing vortex of torrid black filth forming above the gate. Eyeing the Temple of the Gods, Isalamei set loose the burgeoning tempest, a web of shadowy fingers spilling free toward their prey.

Slyphe's voice rang out then, reverberating with the rhythmic susurration of crashing waves as They shouted, "No! I swore to defend this city, and I will! You will not take it!" Hastened by steadfast desire to see a promise kept and an oath held true, Slyphe desperately moved to counter the assault, torrents and geysers and spouts of water coalescing all across the city. The God dissolved to naught before reforming at the heart of the gathering firestorm, Their flesh blistering as they brought Their might to bear. A single massive wave crested the air behind the Shifting One, its sudden crash resounding like a furious thunderclap for all to hear. Dousing Isalemei's storm, Slyphe immediately returned to battle, commanding the frothing swell to surround the Shadow's General in a suffocating dome of turbid seawater.

The roar of Exarch Saebi cut through the air, black blood and noisome gore staining the length of her twin-blade. Launching herself forward into another pack of invaders, she whirled in a frenzy, cutting down beast after beast and ghast after ghast, the Blood of the Dosan lost in the trance of battle. On the opposite side of Enorian, Rhulin continued to gleefully eradicate shadowspawn, the Lance of the Gods flashing as it fired beams of divine fire at the invaders.

The dome of water seeking to suffocate Isalemei writhed in undulant motion, the flaming visage of the General obscured by its rippling mass. Greasy streaks of black began to pierce the aqueous trap, whips of bleak shadow causing the waters to simmer and bubble. The temperature reached a painful, critical mass, the wave boiling away under the General's unbearable heat, unable to quench her raging fires. As hissing steam followed in a pall of sable mist, a smirk flitted over Slyphe's features for the first time since the battle's overture.

Thrusting out a hand, Slyphe twisted Their wrist and what remained of the shimmering dome crumpled, unleashing a multitude of seaborne creatures from its depths. The clicking claws and hungry jaws of countless crabs and crustaceans sang through the air, and Slyphe, still horribly burned, resumed Their assault. Roused to terrible anger by the onslaught of oceanic fauna, Isalemei seethed, her very body crackling as she smouldered. With a wave she wreaked ruin on the plethora of seaborne attackers, sparks of black and violet puissance incinerating them one by one by one by one.

Slyphe lunged forward, trident whirling in one hand while a massive lance of ice formed in the other. Enduring yet more of those punishing black flames, the Maelstrom fought on through Their wounds, refusing to back down. Isalemei dodged the sweeping trident, and Slyphe saw an opportunity, the God releasing the freezing projectile with a faint, but sincere peal of laughter.

The glacial spike passed through the torso of the Shadow General and simply melted to nothing, leaving her unharmed. Trident blows struck repeatedly at her fiery form but she showed no pain, no sign of falter, naught but absolute confidence in that harsh, jagged face. Retaliation came in a fleeting moment, a deafening blast of smoke and shadow and
fire and flame that rolled over Slyphe with the ferocity and inevitability of one of Their own waves.

As the Changing God reeled from the Djinn's vengeful conflagration, Isalemei shaped a sphere of violet midnight in her hands and called out stark, guttural words in the primal tongue of Czjetija. The globe spun on an invisible axis, resonant keening rising before it spiralled away into the city proper, growing larger with each passing moment as it seemed to drink in all the surrounding light. Slowed by countless wounds, Their body ransacked, bleeding, and smoking, Slyphe tore free from the General on a cresting wave of cerulean, desperately striving to intercept the orb's inexorable traversal. Barely reaching the globe in time, Slyphe took the gyrating sphere into Their grasp, clasping it tightly to Their own body in a valiant, final attempt to spare the Hammer from destruction. A high pitched, ringing sound echoed through the streets and the General, still looming above the Landward Gate, clenched a flaming fist.

Time seemed to still for a moment and the Maelstrom addressed Enorian, reminding them that their zeal could not be doused, and asking that they fulfil one last request for Them. "Remind Me of your fervour." They intoned. "Remind Me why your faith is immortal. Shout it for all to hear." In an incredible outpouring of faith and zeal and hope in the holy light, as one the citizens of Enorian lifted their voices to shout and bellow and scream the maxim that had swiftly become the city's motto: "Until the dawn, we are the light."

Slyphe's own voice, weakened and wan, joined them, declaring, "Until the dawn, they are the light...", before the sphere of midnight collapsed, detonating in an explosive staccato boom. The devastating force of black sun turned stygian supernova carved through what remained of the Maelstrom's defence, visiting harrowing agony on Their form. The blast sent Slyphe soaring through the skies toward the Beryl Sea, into which They plummeted with naught but a splash, Their form limp and defeated.

Isalemei seared through the air, pressing further into the city proper. Incandescent sparks showered the streets in black cinders as she moved, but before she could reach the Temple of the Gods, she came to an abrupt stop, eyes suddenly wary. Enorian shimmered as a film of brilliant, rich cobalt seemed to settle over the city, a dozen-eyed gaze taking in the battle through a distant lens of fragmented glass. The Shadow General turned away from the temple and moved to flee, but a radiant helix of sacred flame flared up to curtail her departure. Her own black fire seared angrily at the bonds rooting her in place, but the light merely waxed majestic, unharmed and untainted by the General's presence.

Coalescing from the countless motes of sparkling iridescence lining the streets of the Hammer, a shimmering silhouette overlapped Enorian, the eldritch figure of an angel unlike any other projected from the very heart of Rewh'va. Faceless and composed almost wholly from feathered wings and alabaster flesh, otherworldly light swathed the strangely-proportioned, esoteric and unknowable form of Ael'mael, Blade of the Host. In a voice pealing with the sonorous authority of a thousand tolling bells, Ael'mael intoned, "Dumavai."

Fear kindled in the depths of Isalemei's blacklit eyes as myriad holy bells lifted their voices in rapturous hosannas uncountable and ineffable, their song at once sacred and sublime. Impossibly bright, a blinding storm of holy light gathered in Enorian, a font of captivating illumination burning with ardent fervour and unmatchable devotion. The bells stilled to mute quiescence, and in the midst of that ominous moment of silence, Isalemei screamed. Shifting and contorting into a dazzling spiral of empyreal splendour, the pitiless light laid waste to the Shadowbound Djinn, explosive outbursts of heavenly fire searing and burning and scorching their hated enemy, justice passed on that which should never have been.

Ael'mael withdrew and the projection dissipated in trailing motes, the last vestiges of the manifest light eradicating the shadowspawn still swarming at the Jaru Gate. Exarch Saebi, exhausted but inspired by the presence of Ael'mael, looked up to the heavens in reverence, remnant ashes of the defeated General drifting lifelessly on the wind. And, with a final blast from the Lance of the Gods, the focused ire of the Grand Flame struck at the heart of the corrupted Djinn's commandpost, burning i

Penned by my hand on Quensday, the 12th of Slyphian, in the year 504 MA.

Benedicto