Re: The Grand Battle II! [Round 6:Doomish Temple!]
11-25-2010, 01:54 AM
Originally posted on MSPA by Schazer.
The chamber was eerily, awfully still. Konka Rar didn’t get up; the cracked halves of his staff didn’t rattle and leap to his outstretched hand. The cybernetic eye was disconcertingly leering in Maxwell’s general direction, the fact it didn’t whir and wheel around of its own volition like the fencer wished it comically would made the situation that palpable bit more disturbing.
There wasn’t much left to joke about.
Three golems, then four, had risen unmarred and noiseless from the stone below. Vyrm’n slouched in the doorway Gestalt had already followed Clara down, and Maxwell watched her watching the golems wait. She wasn’t actually paying attention; she didn’t really care – yet simultaneously, she was acutely aware of not just every bone and component of the lich that littered the chamber, but every desecrated atom of stone that the magician had bent out of place. The Faceless - contrary to an observer’s impression that she was intensely interested - was positively straining to actively not care, to shut out the all-pervading anger of the rock-
The elemental had been tasked with a duty, and gifted mind enough by the one who had enlisted it to take pride in its work. Solitude had not concerned it, but neither had the arrival of those whose exploits it had so faithfully transcribed. Yes, it would’ve conceded had anyone asked it (were anyone able to comprehend it), that these ones were not the ones supposed to be here. Yes, the one who’d brought them here had spat on the entity’s labour of emotionless love, but he was like the giver, of visions and mind and purpose, and though the gifts of the second were not as appreciated as those of the first, they were gifts nonetheless. And when the second’s gift, of the carvings graced with life and movement (even if they were, yes, the ones not foretold), was violent and destructive, the third stepped in. It gave the desecrator a chance, let it make the first move.
And so Vyrm’n waited, trying her hardest not to think about any of this. The golems waited, offering the lich his last chance to make the first move. The same respect the master’s compatriots offered the despicable thing.
The noise was getting worse, the vague yet intense fury of the stone rising like bile. Vyrm’n had to get out, stand somewhere again without a sky-incarcerating mile of rock suffusing her with feelings of murderous rage for a lich she could care less about, and reverence for a Grandmaster she planned to kill.
Vyrm’n.
There was a dagger stuck in somewhere approximating the shadow’s chest. The schrotgolem’s presence hung in the air about her like a haze; Vyrm’n felt ill. Withdrawing the knife and explaining the situation to “Clara”, Gestalt extracted several cardboard boxes, leaving them flat on the ground. It had been listening to the channelled stream of semi-conscious chatter long enough, and things made a little more sense.
Rest on that. It should break your contact with this mind that is troubling you. I will find a means by which we may… escape this Battle.
The Faceless was too beleaguered to protest, and slunk away from the doorway before slumping gratefully on the boxes. It didn’t shut out all the anger, but there was room enough again in Vyrm’n’s mind for her own thoughts. “Clara” enquired whether putting a blanket on top was appropriate, and though Gestalt couldn’t tell whether the Grandmaster was being condescending or confused, the nun was eventually convinced into leaving the convalescing shadow in peace.
Maxwell wasn’t sure what motivated him to intrude on the room of statues – perhaps it was his conscience seeing accusation in the glare of an unseeing cybernetic eye. More to stop it staring at him than anything else, he slunk in and pocketed the eyeball, and started violently. A fifth agglom of rock had stealthily emerged, right behind him. With a faint prickling noise, a hairline grin zigzagged its way across its boulder of a head, before it split in two and uttered a settling-shale sigh. Two dully glowing eyes stared from within the rough-hewn jaws, boring into Maxwell with a placid hostility. There was something blankly angry there, yes, but it wasn’t directed at him.
Something small and broken stirred in a corner of the room across from Maxwell; a toe bone he’d been making a concerted to not look too hard at chattered by the genius’ feet. The bones and fragments of bone close to the shattered bulk of the necromancer twitched slowly back together, like a tiny creature yanked on invisible, connecting threads. The golems watched, and Maxwell inched his way round the perimeter of the central chamber to get a better look. The sounds the man himself made, the scuff of his boots, his shallow, cautious breathing, were the only thing distracting him from the tiny scrape of a jawbone dragging its way back to its skull. Snapped limbs couldn’t seem to heal, but they slid back in place as best they could. When the oppressive silence was pierced by a little beep from his pocket, Maxwell nearly sagged in relief. He hastened to Konka’s side, standing awkwardly aside as the necromancer rebuffed his help standing.
The swordsman glanced from intruder to guardians, the golems’ blank gazes affixed on Konka. The necromancer had struggled into a sitting position, leaning on the wall, when Maxwell stepped between him and the ominous monoliths. One of them struck up a chatter, like a pebble tumbling down a distant slope.
“D-don’t hurt him.”
The lich uttered a rasping chuckle; a mere husk of his former mechanised voice. “Admirable, boy, but ultimately useless.”
Maxwell turned, and stared about halfway up the wall. Konka Rar hung limply there, suspended from a stone fist clamped round his chest and remaining arm. The little skittering noises the golems were making rose slowly in volume, the sound of more boulders joining the impending landslide. The skull, eye sockets lit dully green or no, couldn’t help Maxwell read the lich’s expression; the resigned hiss that whispered forth from it made it clearer.
“She said… I was a duplicate. Which means the true Konka Rar fights on in the Savage Brawl.”
The cascade of rock grew louder, the temple walls themselves seeming to join in. The floor might’ve been shaking, or maybe it was just an unfulfilled expectation on Maxwell’s mind’s part, taking steps to jitteringly compensate for the sensory dissonance. The lich chuckled again.
“I doubt these golems would indulge me a last request, so you’d better.”
“I… what?”
“The first round. It was in an underground cavern, described as the afterlife. A young woman was fatally wounded and triggered a powerful freezing curse on her death. The most distinctive contestant would be… a giant one-eyed meatball.” The necromancer paused, begrudgingly acknowledging how absurd his story was. He pressed on, urgently. “With noodles. I’m aware you’ve already eliminated half of the chambers, but this will doubtless save you time.” Maxwell blinked, somewhat put out that the lich had seen through his seemingly aimless explorations. The smirk on those gaunt features was more imagined by the man than consciously pulled by Konka.
“Find out whether I – whether the real Konka Rar survived and won.” The necromancer made an irritated little sound, as the rumbling was interrupted by the prickle of a seam splitting the wall on which he was pinned. “If he emerged victorious, disregard the following. If not… If that Organizer spoke the truth, and my… vacuum cleaner won its battle… I entrust you with the task of ensuring it receives its new orders.”
Maxwell was about to point out even he could tell what a ridiculous request that was, when the chanting, if the chorus of granite on granite could be called that, reached an earthen crescendo. It was so loud it astounded Maxwell the roof wasn’t caving in on top of him. The split yawned open without warning, the doorways on either side of the patch of wall buckling aside to accommodate the expanding crack. The stone fist gripping the necromancer remained in place, its misshapen, grotesquely long “arm” reaching out of the black chasm that opened around it. The darkness within was more than the absence of light – it had substance and inexorable flow.
And it thundered. The weak fire in the lich’s eyes flared up, as he mustered the last of his reserves to raise his voice above the roar, issuing his final, impossible, ludicrous order.
“My final command for Eximo, to be rewarded with freedom on its successful completion.
Destroy the Grandmasters. Every last o-”
His words were torn out of him as the arm contracted sharply, pulling him into the shadows without protest. With alarming speed, the stone jaws crashed shut, the eventually settling dust revealing an unmarred temple wall.
Behind Maxwell, one golem uttered a satisfied clatter; before they melted as silent one back into the floor.
The chamber was eerily, awfully still. Konka Rar didn’t get up; the cracked halves of his staff didn’t rattle and leap to his outstretched hand. The cybernetic eye was disconcertingly leering in Maxwell’s general direction, the fact it didn’t whir and wheel around of its own volition like the fencer wished it comically would made the situation that palpable bit more disturbing.
There wasn’t much left to joke about.
Three golems, then four, had risen unmarred and noiseless from the stone below. Vyrm’n slouched in the doorway Gestalt had already followed Clara down, and Maxwell watched her watching the golems wait. She wasn’t actually paying attention; she didn’t really care – yet simultaneously, she was acutely aware of not just every bone and component of the lich that littered the chamber, but every desecrated atom of stone that the magician had bent out of place. The Faceless - contrary to an observer’s impression that she was intensely interested - was positively straining to actively not care, to shut out the all-pervading anger of the rock-
The elemental had been tasked with a duty, and gifted mind enough by the one who had enlisted it to take pride in its work. Solitude had not concerned it, but neither had the arrival of those whose exploits it had so faithfully transcribed. Yes, it would’ve conceded had anyone asked it (were anyone able to comprehend it), that these ones were not the ones supposed to be here. Yes, the one who’d brought them here had spat on the entity’s labour of emotionless love, but he was like the giver, of visions and mind and purpose, and though the gifts of the second were not as appreciated as those of the first, they were gifts nonetheless. And when the second’s gift, of the carvings graced with life and movement (even if they were, yes, the ones not foretold), was violent and destructive, the third stepped in. It gave the desecrator a chance, let it make the first move.
And so Vyrm’n waited, trying her hardest not to think about any of this. The golems waited, offering the lich his last chance to make the first move. The same respect the master’s compatriots offered the despicable thing.
The noise was getting worse, the vague yet intense fury of the stone rising like bile. Vyrm’n had to get out, stand somewhere again without a sky-incarcerating mile of rock suffusing her with feelings of murderous rage for a lich she could care less about, and reverence for a Grandmaster she planned to kill.
Vyrm’n.
There was a dagger stuck in somewhere approximating the shadow’s chest. The schrotgolem’s presence hung in the air about her like a haze; Vyrm’n felt ill. Withdrawing the knife and explaining the situation to “Clara”, Gestalt extracted several cardboard boxes, leaving them flat on the ground. It had been listening to the channelled stream of semi-conscious chatter long enough, and things made a little more sense.
Rest on that. It should break your contact with this mind that is troubling you. I will find a means by which we may… escape this Battle.
The Faceless was too beleaguered to protest, and slunk away from the doorway before slumping gratefully on the boxes. It didn’t shut out all the anger, but there was room enough again in Vyrm’n’s mind for her own thoughts. “Clara” enquired whether putting a blanket on top was appropriate, and though Gestalt couldn’t tell whether the Grandmaster was being condescending or confused, the nun was eventually convinced into leaving the convalescing shadow in peace.
Maxwell wasn’t sure what motivated him to intrude on the room of statues – perhaps it was his conscience seeing accusation in the glare of an unseeing cybernetic eye. More to stop it staring at him than anything else, he slunk in and pocketed the eyeball, and started violently. A fifth agglom of rock had stealthily emerged, right behind him. With a faint prickling noise, a hairline grin zigzagged its way across its boulder of a head, before it split in two and uttered a settling-shale sigh. Two dully glowing eyes stared from within the rough-hewn jaws, boring into Maxwell with a placid hostility. There was something blankly angry there, yes, but it wasn’t directed at him.
Something small and broken stirred in a corner of the room across from Maxwell; a toe bone he’d been making a concerted to not look too hard at chattered by the genius’ feet. The bones and fragments of bone close to the shattered bulk of the necromancer twitched slowly back together, like a tiny creature yanked on invisible, connecting threads. The golems watched, and Maxwell inched his way round the perimeter of the central chamber to get a better look. The sounds the man himself made, the scuff of his boots, his shallow, cautious breathing, were the only thing distracting him from the tiny scrape of a jawbone dragging its way back to its skull. Snapped limbs couldn’t seem to heal, but they slid back in place as best they could. When the oppressive silence was pierced by a little beep from his pocket, Maxwell nearly sagged in relief. He hastened to Konka’s side, standing awkwardly aside as the necromancer rebuffed his help standing.
The swordsman glanced from intruder to guardians, the golems’ blank gazes affixed on Konka. The necromancer had struggled into a sitting position, leaning on the wall, when Maxwell stepped between him and the ominous monoliths. One of them struck up a chatter, like a pebble tumbling down a distant slope.
“D-don’t hurt him.”
The lich uttered a rasping chuckle; a mere husk of his former mechanised voice. “Admirable, boy, but ultimately useless.”
Maxwell turned, and stared about halfway up the wall. Konka Rar hung limply there, suspended from a stone fist clamped round his chest and remaining arm. The little skittering noises the golems were making rose slowly in volume, the sound of more boulders joining the impending landslide. The skull, eye sockets lit dully green or no, couldn’t help Maxwell read the lich’s expression; the resigned hiss that whispered forth from it made it clearer.
“She said… I was a duplicate. Which means the true Konka Rar fights on in the Savage Brawl.”
The cascade of rock grew louder, the temple walls themselves seeming to join in. The floor might’ve been shaking, or maybe it was just an unfulfilled expectation on Maxwell’s mind’s part, taking steps to jitteringly compensate for the sensory dissonance. The lich chuckled again.
“I doubt these golems would indulge me a last request, so you’d better.”
“I… what?”
“The first round. It was in an underground cavern, described as the afterlife. A young woman was fatally wounded and triggered a powerful freezing curse on her death. The most distinctive contestant would be… a giant one-eyed meatball.” The necromancer paused, begrudgingly acknowledging how absurd his story was. He pressed on, urgently. “With noodles. I’m aware you’ve already eliminated half of the chambers, but this will doubtless save you time.” Maxwell blinked, somewhat put out that the lich had seen through his seemingly aimless explorations. The smirk on those gaunt features was more imagined by the man than consciously pulled by Konka.
“Find out whether I – whether the real Konka Rar survived and won.” The necromancer made an irritated little sound, as the rumbling was interrupted by the prickle of a seam splitting the wall on which he was pinned. “If he emerged victorious, disregard the following. If not… If that Organizer spoke the truth, and my… vacuum cleaner won its battle… I entrust you with the task of ensuring it receives its new orders.”
Maxwell was about to point out even he could tell what a ridiculous request that was, when the chanting, if the chorus of granite on granite could be called that, reached an earthen crescendo. It was so loud it astounded Maxwell the roof wasn’t caving in on top of him. The split yawned open without warning, the doorways on either side of the patch of wall buckling aside to accommodate the expanding crack. The stone fist gripping the necromancer remained in place, its misshapen, grotesquely long “arm” reaching out of the black chasm that opened around it. The darkness within was more than the absence of light – it had substance and inexorable flow.
And it thundered. The weak fire in the lich’s eyes flared up, as he mustered the last of his reserves to raise his voice above the roar, issuing his final, impossible, ludicrous order.
“My final command for Eximo, to be rewarded with freedom on its successful completion.
Destroy the Grandmasters. Every last o-”
His words were torn out of him as the arm contracted sharply, pulling him into the shadows without protest. With alarming speed, the stone jaws crashed shut, the eventually settling dust revealing an unmarred temple wall.
Behind Maxwell, one golem uttered a satisfied clatter; before they melted as silent one back into the floor.
peace to the unsung peace to the martyrs | i'm johnny rotten appleseed
clouds is shaky love | broke as hell but i got a bunch of ringtones
eyes blood red bruise aubergine | Sue took something now Sue doesn't sleep | saint average, day in the life of
woke up in the noon smelling doom and death | out the house, great outdoors
staying warm in arctic blizzard | that's my battle 'til I get inanimate | still up in the same clothes living like a gameshow
clouds is shaky love | broke as hell but i got a bunch of ringtones
eyes blood red bruise aubergine | Sue took something now Sue doesn't sleep | saint average, day in the life of
woke up in the noon smelling doom and death | out the house, great outdoors
staying warm in arctic blizzard | that's my battle 'til I get inanimate | still up in the same clothes living like a gameshow