** Nonimportant Revamp ** Yunzhong Hou Synava2
This is the first novella I ever wrote, and I must admit it is horrid. So why am I posting it? I figure that by putting it here, it might be improved. Whatever, it’s like 3 years old20:56, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
There are eight different types of tokuru speaking creatures:kinors (~1.5 meters tall, there are kizazs and kisasis (kinor/kinors when using both, they are entirely the same, just kizazs are swifter and kisasis possess magick, though all kisasis are weaker than kizazs in physique. They look like humans), spiros (creatures who are very mysterious), goblins, (~1 meters tall, they are known for stealth, many are thieves or spies), skullkas (they are powerful and tall (~2.5 meters tall), elves (~2 meters tall, long lived), humans (~1.5 meters tall, highly populated), shadons (~1.5 meters tall, light is like acid to them), fikos (~1.5 meters tall creatures)
The humans had come a few decades before The Gate of Souls was created, when they had found the planet they had inhabited it. In time, crossbreeding began and the humans became part of the culture, those who stayed at least. The humans had named the other creatures by the closest thing they could relate to with their own myths and legends. The skullkas insisted though not be called giants, as when they read the myths of giants, they found that it made the term giant mean fool
Nizo was an island off the shore of Kiniz, continent of the kinors. It was a field, as trees didn’t grow on it. It was about a meter above sea level at its highest point. Two kinors lived there.
Kizox was a kizaz, he was a runt who had been left on Nizo at the age of seven, with his twin brother, Kikaz (who was a kisas), to die. There hadn’t been a runt, or any twins, for about 350 years and the kinors had no intention in keeping them. They wanted pure blood.
The twins had been left with the gifts of their parents. Cloth, fabric and a sewing kit. Kizox had dark crimson hair and bright golden eyes, he wore beige overalls, made by his mother to fit him. Kikaz had dark teal hair with bright purple eyes, he wore simple pants and a cotton shirt, that were too big for him.
Lately, Kikaz had been working in something, but seemed to have no intent in telling his brother. Kizox didn’t want to appear nosy, but he really wanted to know what his brother was doing.
After several days, Kizox, frustrated, asked his brother: “How much longer are you going to keep your plan a secret Kikaz?”
“Uh? I thought you didn’t want to know. But fine, I’ll tell you: I’m making a boa-” but before Kikaz could finish his answer, his anxious brother asked him: “Why?”.
“I was getting to that. When I was five I read that once every thirteen years the ocean rises by nine meters. The tides are rising. Soon Nizo will be swallowed by the waters, for about a month.”
“So we’ll live in a boat?”
“No, we’re going to Kion, our homeland.”
“They don’t want us there.”
“We’ll go on a cargo ship, to the elves. They have a wonderful library. I’ve wanted to read again for ten years.”
“Well, I guess we have no choice.”
“Exactly. But I’d like some help though.”
“Why didn’t you ask me, before?”
In less than a day, the twins were able to finish the raft, just in time too. For in that very same night, the seven moons aligned, pulling up the water with their gravity. The twins fell asleep on the raft, that was on Nizo’s beaches, and, startled, waked up in the ocean. Nizo had already vanished, and now they had to travel west, with a terrible storm threatening them…
The kinor twins were traveling due west, towards a port, when a crackle shuddered their skulls. Within seconds, it was absolute chaos. They took down the sails. This was the worst storm they had ever seen and it headed west, towards them.
“Lay flat, head up!” Kizox shouted through the loud storm.
The storm howled for hours, but the two kinors were soaked within seconds. And worst of all, at all times they had to make sure that the raft was still heading west, or they would die of hunger, lost in the ocean. Luckily, they had made a raft, for a boat would’ve sunk with the rain…
It wasn’t until the sun rose again that they arrived at the port. It wasn’t large, there was holding space for only two ships (and only was occupied), a single shack supervised the goods and there was a beach for smaller crafts, which was where the twins headed to. A male kisas was standing there, wearing a simple red shirt and orange pants, his hair was red, with dark-gray streaks.
As soon as they hit the shore the kisas coldly said “I don’t know how you’re still alive…but it won’t last long.”, to which Kizox answered, confused:“What the…”
The kisas raised his hand and suddenly a bright beam of energy rapidly flowed towards them. Kikaz put out his left hand in reflexive impulse and somehow absorbed the energy with the palm of his hands.
“Good catch. You plan on killing yourself? Cause I’d realease it.” calmly replied the kisas.
Kikaz limply raised his hand and the beam flared towards the kisas, who quickly extinguished it.
“So you know magick, runt?” the kisas rudely spat out.
“N-no?” Kikaz staggered the word in utter delirium and confusion.
Suddenly, the kisas fell with a clunk, revealing Kizox holding a rock the size of his head standing behind him.
“He’ll be like that for some time. But we better leave now.” Kizox explained.
Kikaz replied by vomiting, just before fainting.
Kizox dragged Kikaz towards the town. At the entrance, a fikos wearing colourful clothes, a sack, and carried a wool tube with a sword inside greeted them.
“I see you dealt with Dazanra, the stormbringer without my aid. Sorry for being late. I’m Fikar, I’ve come to escort you both to Zovna.” he stated.
“Why?” Kizox questioned
“You’ll see, now come. They’ll be looking for you two, soon…”
The outer area of Kion was barren, made from hard earth, but it was full of minerals like iron, nickel and granite. It was a perfect place to build foundations on, and it is one of the reasons that most of Kizo’s towns are built on the coastal line, that and the advantages of trade, salt and fish. Trees barely grow on this area and the grass was short.
However, if one went deeper into Kion, one would notice that grass was longer, the minerals more tender, and the terrain was plentiful in cinnamon and birch, which had evolved to flourish in this ecosystem. An undergrowth of berries also grew.
Once they were farther south from Kion, and Kikaz was awake, Fikar stopped and suggested that the group rested below one of the many hills at the forest’s border. Fikar gave them bread and water, and after they were done eating he dropped the large bag he carried and opened it to reveal two old looking encyclopedias with blanked red covers, a few simple shruikens, a sharp dagger, a rope and sacks that jangled with the sound of coins.
“So, you are Kikaz, the kisas, and your are Kizox, the kizaz?” Fikar asked.
“Yes.” the two replied.
“Well, Kizox, let’s start with you, a dagger is shorter than a short sword, but it is longer than a knife. It is light and simple, best used with stealth and speed. Now, the shruiken is a bladed disk. Here’s a book on combat physics and tactics,” Fikar told Kizox while handing him one large book, the dagger and the shruikens. “Now Kikaz, here’s a book on magick and magickal tactics,” he handed Kikaz the other large book, “make sure to fully understand the parts about “The Laws of Magick”, and “The Consequences of Magick”. It is vital information to assure that you don’t receive a swift and foolish death.”
“I-I’ll do…that.” replied Kikaz nervously…
There are three basic types of magick: spells, natural magick, and automatic. Natural is the kind of magick that invoke energy to create and maintain the attribute chosen, this strand of magick is very energy consuming but is quite simple to use. Spells consume no energy, but are time consuming. Some can take years to cast, some take only a few minutes. Spells don’t use words but matter, herbs, minerals, spices, blood, etc.
Wizards (users of natural magick) have an area in their mind (that isn’t used by a normal person) to harness enough energy for the generation of an attribute force. This task requires the heart to direct more blood through a secondary vein in the neck, ensuring dizziness and nausea. The body will feel weak and numb, because its blood is going to the mind. If used carelessly, the user can die, and the farther the target is, the more energy it requires.
Spells are very simple. Anyone can use them. They just require the knowledge of how chemicals in matter will react to the other chemicals in other matter, in order to create powerful concoctions, potions and medicine. people that know how to mix ingredients to form spells are called alchemists.
Automatic magick is the most powerful, deadly (to user and target) and complex of all types of magick. Magicians (automatic magick users) have a part in their mind like those of wizards, except it acts instinctively and is more powerful, due to an extra reserve of energy in the mind. it is impossible to control when or how it is used. Little is known of it, because it’s hard to research…
By the second day, the three had ventured much deeper into the forest. The minerals were softer and more tender. The hills had flattened from erosion and trees had grown. Only rich cinnamon trees and mighty birch trees grew, giving the forest a gloomy and mysterious feel, with the low growing berry bushes adding to the atmosphere.
“You know…you never told us what the place your taking us to is like, so me and Kikaz… demand an explanation.” Kizox stated on the second day.
Fikar straightened, smiled and easily replied “I expected you to ask soon, and I’ll tell you all I am allowed to tell, but that’s not much. First of all, I’m not with Serval. The kisas who attacked you was with that guild. I’m with Zovna, which is on Juroz, the island of the Humans. I am a mere escort for you two, I am bringing you to see our warlord, by orders of the master. Once we get to Zovna, the warlord will explain all he wishes to tell, and then you will be brought to the master to dine and converse.”
Kizox quickly laid out his new questions “What do you mean by ‘guild’ and who is this ‘warlord’ and ‘master’ of yours?”
Fikar reflexively replied “A guild has a turf which other guilds will try to take from its owner. Each guild controls an area. The larger your turf, the more it is attacked and it is harder to find the intruder. The master is its leader and the warlord is its combat organizer. I may not tell you any more than I have told, but I may give you this map of Synava, our planet. Zovna will give you both an advanced education, as you only learned to read, write and talk from your parents…”
“Runes are one of the 3 types of spells, but there are also different types of runes, the most commonly used types being potions and runes,” Fikar stated on the third morning while having cinnamon ground berries for breakfast on neatly peeled cinnamon bark.
“You should write this down with charcoal on your birch bark,” the twins immediately peeled some birch and received cinnamon charcoal. “Runes are stones filled or lathered with ointments. They are useful in a number of ways, such as bursting smoke to escape when you’re in a disadvantage position or creating an energy beam without energy. Some runes are forbidden to create, such as the doom rune. That if it touches any DNA, it causes a chain reaction of destruction of that DNA, killing the victim. It takes 3 years to create,” Fikar dictated for the two of them.
“Rune blades are swords containing runes in them. Their usual price range is from 100 platinums to 10,000 platinum … My sword is a rune blade … It would sell for about 4,000 platinums it has a gravity rune in it, making it light and easy to handle, and an energizer rune, allowing me to use it for a longer time, use more magick and require little sleep…”, Fikar made a pause before continuing.
Kizox than asked “Can I eat some breakfast? I’m starving…and you’re speaking faster than I can write.”
Kikaz then chipped in “Ya, I’m only at the price range of rune blades.”
“Fine, though I suggest you learn to paraphrase.” Fikar responded and repeated the paragraph for the twins to copy, followed with “That’s all for today, we need to cover ground…”
At noon, after the group made another stop and ate more cinnamon ground berries, they traveled for about ten minutes until they heard a rustle in the trees. Which prompted Fikar to immediately stop and tell the others: “You two, over here, we’re being followed.”
Immediately the two ran to form a triangular defense position. Kizox took out the dagger and the shruikens, but Fikar told him not to use the shruikens, so he put them away. Fikar took his sword and Kikaz prepared to focus his mind.
Fikar then called out “We know you’re there and we will continue to consider better formations, come out.”
That is when Kizox saw a shruiken going towards Fikar. He leapt forward extending his hand farther, and it happened. The shruiken severed his hand, he bled, he fell, he yelled. Fikar turned, another shruiken came, Fikar caught it, Fikar threw it back, something else yelled, a skullka with a shruiken in his knee ran out and charged his massive body at the three, Fikar started to lose his defining features, the skullka tripped in shock, Fikar became a glob, the skullka shot up, Fikar started to become taller, the skullka thought for a moment, Fikar gained skullka features, the skullka charged forward, Fikar gained his unique features, the skullka prepared to send a blow, Fikar (as a skullka) feinted on the skullka, the skullka tumbled under Fikar, Kikaz threw an energy ray at the skullka, the skullka passed out and Kikaz vomited.
Kikaz, now in a drunken state, pulled Kizox away and woke him up. They then hauled Fikar, with his sleeves ripped, shirt stretched and pants torn apart, looking like shorts, away and woke him up…
Kikaz asked immediately, “What did you just do?”
This was when Kizox stepped into the conversation “I think we should be healing my hand now.”
Fikar bent over and said “Kikaz help Kizox, I’m going to be feinting and vomiting all day, we’ll talk in the evening, once I’m a fikos again …”
That evening, when Fikar was a fikos again, Kizox had a question. “I have a question for you, how do you change your form?”
Fikar hesitated before replying “I am a morpher. I can control my DNA and other shape factors, very few can morph, though there are morphing runes…Morphing is an advanced magick, write this down, ”the twins retrieved birch and charcoal. Fikar continued “Advanced magick is high on energy consumption, there are 6 basic advanced magick: fikos have morphing, kinors have soul bond, shadons have pigment, elves have pressure, goblins have inertia, skullkas have hormonic, spiros have pure energy… Few can use their advanced ability because there are conditions…You two can soul bond, no questions now please…Kinors must be twins and must have similar mental development, in order to join energy flows…Fikos must have simple form factors…Shadons must have a secondary vein… Elves must have high mental growth and a large secondary vein…Skullkas must have a secondary vein…Goblins must have a mind capable of neutralizing energy…Humans require a secondary vein…Spiros must have lots of energy, about 5000% more than I’m capable of. They require a high capacity and many energy reserves…All need the gene for that mental function too…”
Once Fikar was asleep, the twins whispered to each other, as they always did, every night
“I think we should run away.” Kizox muttered again, like all the other nights, “We can use a soul bond to have two advantages, he’s out numbered and we can soul bond.”
“But now we know he can morph. Besides he told us we can soul bond, why would our enemy tell us our strengths.” Kikaz pointed out.
“He never told us how though.” Kikaz objected.
“… You’re right…Fine, we’ll leave tonight… ” Kikaz thoughtfully remarked.
It rained that night, nevertheless the twins traveled through the path, and, in the next morning, had cinnamon ground for a meal. They walked for two days without sleep and slept deep within the forest.
When Fikar awoke, he saw the runts had left and immediately panicked. First he called out for them and looked around the area when he found their tracks in the mud. He tracked them, using his rune blade to run for the day down the trail, but he hit a fork in the path. The mud had dried and the trees had blocked the rain. He went left, but the twins had gone right, had he looked at the cinnamon trees, he would have seen one tree 3 meters away peeled in one area. He traveled on for three days down the empty trail…
It was a bright, hundred meter tall room with a pure diamond dome at the top, from it hung a titanically enormous chandelier that reflected the sun’s rays of light with every jewel one could possibly name, it had many meters of height and width and a perfect diamond at its very lower tip. The entrance door was larger than two human adults and was made of fine topaz. The enterer would have a golden velvet rug to walk to the master. The walls were pure silver and the floor was tiled with the finest ceramics, encrusted with an assortment of jewels.
At the southern end of the room, regally sat an elf, young and powerful, yet far from his prime. He wore a peacock-blue robe(to fit his peacock-green eyes) and had his jet-black hair cut at chin length at the back and the front of his ear’s top. He wore peridot earrings. On the northern end, an odd creature lazily stood, it wasn’t of the eight races but was a creature that looked as if it didn’t know what it was supposed to be.
The creature had black goat legs (with rusty orange fox feet), an emerald-green snake’s head (with mystically metallic teal colored cat eyes that when gazing at directly seemed as if they were reading your mind), rusty colored cat ears, white mouse hands and black bat wings that could wrap its ferret like body. The only tokuru-like thing about it was that it had a human-like anatomy. It wore a dark-green short-sleeved shirt with dark-red sleeves coming out from beneath the short sleeves(with two holes in the back for the wings to squeeze out of).
The creature wore a dark-blue hood that pointed at the top (at the end of the point were three long and very acute triangular strands of dark green silk. Underneath the hood was a titanium tiara, it had an opal eye (the pupil being a pure amethyst) in the center and the sides were ruby, with emerald bordering around the tiara. The pants were dark-aqua-green silk and baggy for its thin legs. It wore black gloves that had holes for the razor sharp mouse claws that held a diamond katana, containing an energizer rune, an energy-absorber rune and an anti-gravity rune.
“I need more turf. How much longer until the two runts get here?” demanded the elf.
“Fikar is the escort, not me.” the odd creature replied. “now, why did you call me?”
“I need more turf.” the elf stated again.
“We are dealing with intruders, we don’t have enough warriors to ambush another guild.” the creature calmly replied.
“Draft the villages.” the elf retorted.
“We are here to help them, not draft them.” the creature countered.
This was replied by the elf yelling out while standing up “…You might be the most powerful mortal here, but I will not tolerate your repeated refusals to obey orders anymore! You will cooperate or be expelled from this guild, fiend.”
At this, the creature took a rune out and threw it at the dome saying “Yes, I am quite a fiend am I not?”. As the rune hit the dome, it cracked, letting out its true rune, a destruction rune. The diamond shattered at contact with the rune and the creature flew up and out of the room, away from the palace, away from Juroz…
‘That fiend!’ the elf thought to himself in disgust ‘breaking my dome! It takes a year to fuse diamonds together…I’ll have to summon my alchemists…’
The twins had woken to the sound of a birch twig cracking under a foot. They suspected it was Fikar and were more alert. They had been resting in a secure area, thick with trees around them, on a hill that contained strong minerals in it, holding it together and not allowing trees to grow well on the hill, this way they could see anyone coming near them, couldn’t be easily seen and had the higher ground.
“Fikar?” Kikaz asked to the form below.
“I’m not Fikar, I’m Tezre, the skullka.” the voice came low and powerful, as the skullka they had met walked up the hill.
The twins wanted to run but the skullka’s legs were much longer. Kisas threw an energy orb at Tezre, but he held out a rune and the energy diminished to nothing.
“This is an energy nullifier, it absorbs and then destroys the energy.” Tezre explained to the vomiting Kikaz, “Now come with me, magick is useless and I overpower both of you by a long shot in strength.” he took out his sword while talking.
“You’re going to kill us anyways.” Kizox spat out at Tezre while taking his dagger out and shruiken designed to tear deep into flesh.
Kikaz had an idea, if he sent his mental waves to Kizox they might be able to converse, if Kizox could use magick…As Kikaz sent his thoughts to Kizox he remembered that Kizox had a smaller secondary vein too, it might allow enough blood to get to the brain. As Kizox received the message ‘focus your thoughts to Kikaz’ the vein expanded to let blood through to the mind. Kikaz, unfortunately, received an emotion, not a message, an emotion of confusion.
Kizox vomited from his first telepathic message. Now it struck Kikaz that maybe a soul bond is combining the energy of two minds. Kikaz sent the message to Kizox to send his energy to him. Kikaz than focused on sending a weak strand of energy to Kizox. As the weak energy wouldn’t be enough to feint Kizox. Kizox sent a slowly growing strand of energy to Kikaz. Kikaz and Kizox now thought as one and sent a weak strand of energy towards Tezre.
Tezre took out his energy nullifier rune. The rune was absorbing the energy but as it had no time to disperse the energy, the second law of thermodynamics came into play and burnt Tezre’s hand, who then dropped it and was struck with the strand. He passed out after awhile, as he would be for the rest of the next day due to his mind’s incapability to deal with an energy overload.
Meanwhile Kikaz and Kizox, after taking the energy nullifier and Tezre’s entire rune sack (That also contained a flask), walked away vomiting and delirious, while Kizox mournfully remarked “I don’t like telepathy or anything to do with magick anymore, I no longer envy your ability to use magick, but pity you…”
Fikar ran for many more days until he reached the place where the three had been traveling to, Kizo. Kizo traded many products, specially minerals, with the humans and fikos, since they had solid minerals in its soil and there was a mine there. The foundations were wide and tall, at the entrance was the only structure with more than two stories in the whole town, it was very tall.
The port had seventeen docks for trade ships, three for cruisers, thirty for small sized crafts and another ten for warships defending the port. Most of the town was built on a large hill with a central tower. The town region was owned by the guild of Serval.
Fikar knew that the Whoppin’ Wallop pub, in Kizo was a prime source of information (if you could tell the were drunkards from the sobers). The pub was large, but it was still crowded most of times, mainly by drunks. It’s rock floor was lathered with different alcohols and the scent was revolting to the nose. When he reached the place, he paid the fee of one copper coin to take the stage. When he reached the top he asked “Have any of you seen two kinor runts?”
The crowd first erupted with the drunkards laughing and yelling that the runts were left on Nizo a decade ago. But one of the people who had come to talk of gossip, had some coffee and tea to be social…maybe some alcohol to sip at for a couple of hours, yelled out “Juss zis…ziz mornin’…shme mashked rish…zish…rich guy…he ashked ze shame thing…only he alsho…alsho ashked for a Fikos named Fikar shoo!”
Fikar immediately responded anxiously “Where is he?”
“I’m not…not! Going sho yell over theshe shcreaming drunkardsh…shum…shume…cume over here!” the person screamed over the drunkards.
Fikar leaped off the stage and jolted towards the gossip table. Three kizazs and two kisasis sat there, one of the kisas was having dark coffee, the other green tea, one kizaz was drinking light coffee, the second was sipping at her beer and the third was having herbal tea.
The dark coffee drinker immediately spoke up in a quick voice “He asked and when he saw everyone laughing he hopped off the stage ran down the path that leads to the Forbidden Forest.”
Fikar asked curiously “Why is it forbidden?”
The kisas replied in complete hysterics “Because it has canorks nesting in it, always has, it’s their territory, because the soil has a mixture of hard and soft minerals, that helps grow the rare canork bean tree. They like its beans, I hear it makes a very dark coffee, and a delicious one at that, I’ve always wanted to try canork coffee! In fact now that I think about it, I think he had fox feet, I saw them for a moment. Though it would likely be of delusion!” and with that the Kisas was laughing with his head against the table.
The beer sipper responded “She…Sho…He getsh a little out of hand…hiccup…but you learn to ignore it.”
Fikar thought for awhile and responded “Thanks.”, getting up to leave for the Forbidden Forest…
Fikar ran and ran into the forest. The cinnamon, birch and bean trees (So famous in that region) were merely blurs as he ran. At each passing second there were more and more bean trees, slunking down like weeping willows, taking up space and making the path wider and wider.
He noticed fox-like footprints in the dirt, with the depth showing the muscle power of a goat’s hind legs. He followed the tracks deeper and deeper into the Forbidden Forest. Then he noticed new foot prints, much bigger and much deeper. He ran faster. After some time he saw an immense creature jolting towards him. Its fur was a tangled smear of brownish colors. Its legs were muscular and its jaws containing 243 layers of serrated teeth (as it was 243 years old and at its prime). It was a canork.
The canorks kept their population down by eating each other, for no animals ventured into the Forbidden Forest. They don’t eat their young, they eat others at the age of around 150 years of age. Their natural life span is around 500, rarely will they live this long without being eaten. They can mate at the age of around 50. A pregnant canork will be pregnant for an average of a few years, only giving birth a few decades later, giving birth to around 10 canorks.
Fikar immediately pulled himself up a canork tree branch and climbed as fast as he could. Some of his coins fell out of his sack and landed in the snapping mouth of the canork, it snapped on them and Fikar cringed as he heard them grinding and being crushed into dust. This gave him just enough time to climb out of reach of such a fate.
But the canork was hungry, the herd being far away. It was bashing the tree and Fikar had to hold on with all his might. While holding for his life nervously glancing around for a means to save himself, he saw a form on a nearby tree. He crawled closer in-between bashes and leaped forward, managing to get a grip on a branch and crawling it up again with the canork leaping towards him. A bean came hurtling by his head and into the canork’s mouth, this gave Fikar time to climb, like the coins had.
When he reached the top he saw that it was the creature. The creature immediately asked “Where are the twins?”, and Fikar answered: “They ran away, It’s been 4 days.”
The tree shook, the canork walked away up a hill. The reature spoke quietly “We’re going to go find them and then take them to Zixra, making our own guild. Zovna is drafting, so I was willingly expelled.”
The tree shook hard, the canork had ran down the hill and bashed the tree, Fikar flung in the opposite direction yelling for help. The creature easily created a dense energy field that held Fikar and brought him back to the tree, getting a major headache as consequence.
Fikar fully understood what Nero, the creature, meant. He immediately responded “Thanks, but the twins took a left turn probably, when I was tracking them.”
Nero coldly replied “Then we’re going to go and get them…when the canork gives up from its attempts to eat us.”
Later that afternoon, when the canork left the tree, Nero slowly descended to the ground, followed by Fikar. They took a short-cut through the Forbidden Forest that would lead to the fork Fikar had encountered in the forest path…
The twins had traveled fast and were soon going to enter the Forbidden Forest. They also noticed the same differences that Fikar had noticed when he traveled through the Forbidden Forest.
They stopped when they heard the sounds of crinkling leaves and saw the form of a fikos. Immediately, they got into back to back formation, keeping their heads close together, to have a stable soul bond.
Kikaz warned to the form “We can soul bond, Fikar.”
At this, another form, hidden by the shade appeared. The second form moved forward and approvingly replied “Good, let’s see how much you can charge it and what form it takes.”
The twins immediately caused a steady stream, weak, but stable. It struck the form’s hand, and Kikaz immediately remembered his first usage of magick. Kizox, due to the soul bond, also remembered Kikaz’s memory as his own memory and they corrupted the link, giving the usual effects of magick. But the form didn’t toss it back, it absorbed it instead.
The form disaprovingly replied “That wasn’t very good. I don’t feel refreshed…Now stop fooling around, Fikar and I, have dealt with canorks because of your expedition.”
Kizox, remembering the stories about canorks, questioned “Canorks?”
Nero simply replied “Yes, canorks, now come along we’re going on a merchant ship.”
Kikaz, understanding that they could be slaughtered right now, realized that no harm was meant towards them from Nero or Fikar. Kikaz quickly sent Kizox this explanation. They had found that these tiny mental messages were dealt with easily and that only minor headaches came from doing so. They also had learnt that by thinking as one their disputes were solved less then a second.
Kizox, now agreeing with Kikaz, replied sorrowfully “Well we thought you would kill us, we weren’t sure so we decided to escape for our safety.”
Fikar grinned at this and apologetically replied “Well if that was the case Nero and I would have already killed you both by now.”
Nero now spoke with authority “We should be traveling, the goblins reported Tezre is looking for you two.”
Kikaz proudly replied at this “We met him in the forest and flared him and his energy neutralizer with a soul bond a few days ago. We stole his sack of runes, there are 6 of them, and we stole this flask.”
Fikar complemented the twins, saying “Great! May I see the runes? We’re heading to Kizo.”
Kizox gave the runes and the flask to Fikar. Fikar read the symbols on the spells and muttered “The flask is an energy tonic and the runes are an energy neutralizer, a smoke rune, an energizer, a negative magnet, a positive magnet and a magnifier rune… It’s a standard escape pack, it is pretty useful.”
That day the group exchanged stories about their split up. Though Nero was quiet about what happened before he met Fikar in the forbidden forest. That night, around midnight, they decided to sleep at the edge of the forest…
That morning they traveled to the town market where all the stores were placed, it was an early morning and so the people of Kizo were just waking up. They went to a restaurant, to talk of what they would do next.
Nero chose a table in the corner and stated “So what do we need?”
Kizox sarcastically commented “Anything but ground cinnamon.”
Nero jotted down: eat at a restaurant in his notebook. He then asked “Anything else? Don’t worry, Fikar and I have sacks of coins.”
Kikaz, at this asked “Are there spells that avoid the effects of magick, Nero?”
Nero smiled at this, stretched his hidden scales, and gladly responded “Yes, energy tonics. And they’re not very expensive.” he then wrote: energy tonics.
Fikar now spoke “You should get a weapon, Kikaz.” Nero wrote: one dagger, “And we should get our clothe washed.” Nero finally wrote: four anti-bacterial runes.
They all ate breakfast at a restaurant, and the rest of that morning was spent buying their shopping list, Kikaz got four more energy tonics, a light dagger and anti-bacterial runes.
At noon they headed for the docks, but at the entrance, a person in hysteria jolted at them, laughing uncontrollably. When the dark coffee drinker reached them, he squealed “You’re alive! We thought you were mush now but your alive! Not that I don’t like mush but I like you more and since I like you I don’t want you becoming mush since that wouldn’t be very pleasant I think. Did you get any beans!?”
Fikar looked at the hysterical kisas and responded “No, I’m sorry. But we must be leaving.” at this they walked away, away from the kisas who now was glum. The caffeine had lost it’s effects and his hopes were ruined. He sorrowfully walked back to the pub, shaking his head slowly.
At the dock, the four spotted a reliable transport ship and walked towards it. Nero handed the owner of the ship fifty golds for a one way ticket, and the quartet kept walking on. The merchant was so joyful that he forgot to ask Nero to remove the mask. Which probably saved Nero’s life, as an animal-like person was wanted by Serval. The four settled for the next week.
The ship was a well built one. It’s frame was built with canork lumber and fifteen large oars came out of it’s side to propel it forward with miraculous agility. It’s front bow was a well decorated energy magnifier (with a enormous energy absorber, giving it a upper hand in a conflict). Its ten sails were high, quite wide and could be brought down with ease. When they departed, the wind was on its side, so it would travel doubly fast. Things were finally starting to go well for them.
The four had chosen a small passenger room. The room was rotting so it didn’t amplify your words. There were no windows, and the only source of light was a rune that glowed brightly. The door had a rotting lock that didn’t keep out trespassers, but at least, the door was so rotten that no one could hear through it. It had hay on the floor, where passengers could sleep on, and a flat piece of slate to eat on.
When the door was shut, Kikaz asked Nero “Why did you give the merchant 50 golds?”
Nero hesitated before responding “Because he would have asked me to take my mask off, but amazed with his fortune, he forgot the law.”
Kizox, studying the room’s architecture, spun around towards Nero and asked “Why do you have to keep that mask on any way?”
Again Nero hesitated again, before replying “What you see may not be spoken of with anyone but us.”
At this, bat wings flung from Nero’s back as he lifted his arms in the air, his sleeves falling back, showing his arms. He then pulled off his mask, revealing his serpent like head with its feline ears and cat eyes, bent down to look like he had a normal face under the mask. He moved on as the twins watched in shock to pulling up his pants to reveal goat legs as he kicked off his sandals, showing his fox feet. He lifted his shirt up by a little bit to show the waist of a wolf.
Kizox softly asked in a whisper “What are…what kind of…what race are you of?”
Nero frowned before replying “I’m a spiros … What race I was, I do not know…”
Kikaz suddenly asked “When will we reach Juroz?”
Nero looked at Kikaz and answered “Not very soon, I am the warlord, I had a disagreement with Virk, the master, and was expelled while escaping. We’re going to reestablish in Zixra…Besides I have some personal matters to take care of, this boat is going to Sharoz, the island of the shadons, though.”
Fikar stared at Nero and asked in disbelief “Sharoz!”
Nero reassuringly answered “Why yes only the shadons and the goblins go to Zixra.”
Fikar, completely shocked, shouted at Nero “We should have gone to Goblaina!”
Nero shrugged at this and retorted “I have a friend to meet and a civilization to get things straight with.”
Kizox, listening carefully to the argument asked simply “What’s wrong with the shadons and who is this friend of yours?”
Nero looked at him and simply replied “The shadons don’t have a normal governmental system. It’s dangerous if you aren’t seen very well in their view, but as I am trusted by most we should be safe.”
Fikar got up muttered, disrespectfully “If I had those wings I’d make leave of this boat!”
Nero got up, put his mask on and walked out of the room.
Kikaz, carefully suggested “I think it’s getting dark. I also think we should go get some hay to sleep in, because the water is calm right, and it won’t be hard to sleep.”
The twins went to the hay pile and made beds for themselves and Nero. Fikar laid in the remnants of the original hay pile…
Shortly after the twins fell asleep, Fikar left for the rear deck. The halls were dark and the wood creaked at the weight of Fikar. When he reached the deck, he looked out at the ocean. Kiniz was only a speck the size of the stars now. The town of Kizo only the size of a fruit fly. The water’s voice was dull and gentle, the moss on the side of the boat was absorbing the salt and crystalizing. The moons were all in a half cycle tonight, the tide was still extremely high and reaching their peak. The heat of the day had brought clouds from the water and now the water only lifted into a thin mist during the chill night. Fikar looked around at this world and wondered if the shadons had changed. He was in a deep cloud of thoughts when he heard a loud screech.
Before Fikar had left the room to see the tranquil and prospering view of the broad sea, Nero had also gone to the deck to think. But when he got there he had had a different flow of events. When he reached the deck he traveled to the front to find a kisas standing at the front looking out at the water, as the kisas turned around to see who was there, as he had heard the creaking boards, smiled at Nero, who recognized the face as Serval’s warlord, Dazanra.
Nero grasped his katana and prepared for a combat. He then attempted a intimidation phrase to hold off combat “You couldn’t defeat me even if my arms were bound, wings snapped and my legs broken.”
Dazanra frowned and amusingly asked “Could I have a chance with help?”
Nero heard movement behind himself and leaped into the air, dodging Tezre as he attempted to pulverize Nero. Dazanra sarcastically warned “Watch out for lightning!”and with this, a beam of energy shot through Nero and entered the dense clouds, now rumbling with lightning.
Nero pulled out his katana and it absorbed the beam. The thunder died away. It was around now that Fikar came up to the rear deck. Nero now prepared to send the absorbed energy towards Dazanra when his wings were pierced by two shruikens. Causing him to blast most of his energy reserves at Tezre automatically. Nero screeched a deftly pitch in pain as more shruikens pierced his body. His energy gone and his wings getting tired he ended up smashing into a rotten board and lying in a temporal shock below them all.
Fikar, hearing the screech, sprinted directly towards the riot. When he arrived he encountered Tezre and Dazanra. Dazanra sank behind Tezre and slowly fled as Tezre prepared to crush Fikar. Fikar summoned his energy and prepared to protect himself against Tezre, one of the few skullkas who could use hormonic magick. As Tezre surged forward, his muscles pounding with testosterone, Fikar remembered that the twins were asleep and alone. In shock of this realization his reserves of energy had dispersed and Tezre pounded into his ribs, breaking them into his left lung. Fikar fell with such force that he snapped his spine on a board.
Tezre grinned as he returned to finish killing Nero. As he looked down, a poorly created, low energy containing strand of energy dashed into his forehead. He was being possessed by Nero. Tezre’s mind fought with this intruder but as weak as Nero was, Tezre couldn’t defend his mind enough to save his mentality. Shortly after the mental fight began, he had been possessed by Nero, Tezre would never live again…
While Tezre struggled against Nero’s possession spell, Fikar dragged himself away, with his arms only, as his lower body was paralized in agony. He went to wake the twins, before Dazanra did. As he crawled, he felt scorching pain in his chest. He was creeping slowly when he reached stairs, and as he went down them his ribs pressed his heart rather harshly.
Dazanra, not knowing which room the two twins were sleeping was checking every room. And the workers in the ship didn’t try to stop him, as he had the authority to do so. He searched as fast as possible in order to find them before Fikar did. But even if he didn’t, tonight was a great triumph already. He and Tezre had killed Nero! Zovna’s warlord and Fikar had little chance of survival against Tezre’s hormonic magick. He anxiously tackled the door beside him to reveal, through the broken doorway, a mother kizaz who was holding her baby in her arms. Doing her best to protect it, and looking up fearfully at the trespasser. Dazanra, seeing that this was the wrong room asked
“Do you know where they are holding a couple of kinor twins?”. The mother shook her head, and Dazanra was off to the next room.
Nero, fatigued by the conflict he had just fought, looked to see where Dazanra had gone to, but saw nothing. He looked down to see footmarks in the muddy lumber, and followed them after Dazanra. He ran through the refuge area and looked through all the different broken doorways to see different people with different lives and causing different effects on Synava.
Fikar tumbled down the stairs. His ribs snapped and his spine cracked. He was now relying on adrenalin to keep him conscious. His heart pounded hard, sweat came out of every single porous in his body and his left lung worked twice as hard because his right lung was dead. He prepared to enter a vent when he heard a door’s smashing vibrations echo down the corridor.
Kikaz woke with a start as Kizox woke him, saying that someone was breaking all the doors in, asking for two kinor twins, that Nero wasn’t back and that Fikar was gone. Kikaz jumped up with a start and frantically replied “We should hide … in a vent maybe…quick!”. The twins entered the nearest vent and waited.
Dazanra was preparing to crash into their room (Although he didn’t know that was their room) when he heard foot steps behind him. He turned around and saw Tezre walking towards him. He informally commanded “Help me find the twins Tezre.” and turned around to bash the door. Nero (In Tezre’s body) pumped himself with testosterone and pummeled Dazanra. Dazanra crashed through the floor boards and was lucky enough to land on a box of wool, which deflected his fall. Dazanra laid there, paralyzed and in great shock. He could not believe that Tezre, his loyal ally, had betrayed him.
Fikar tried to drag himself through the tiny vent. He began to panic, thinking that he was going to die in this tiny place, he couldn’t breath, he was struggling, tears started to fill in his eyes, his throat was clogging from the crying. The other vent open and he heard the voices of the twins the other vent had covered. Then Kizox’s voice whispered to Fikar in amazement “Fikar?!? What happened to you? You’re crippled, we need to get you to the medical room!”
Fikar, now stunned about everything, passed out. Kizox pulled Fikar out of the vent. When Kikaz got out of the vent he bumped into a someone large and bulky, and he exclaimed obstreperously. He turned his head towards the person above him in a flash and, revolted, laid his eyes on Tezre.
Kikaz quickly developed energy and prepared to release it, only to receive an energy beam flaring up from below the floor, and blasting both of them into the atmospheric region of a room. In the room there was a carcass that had just transferred its brain’s data into another brain, Nero’s carcass. Nero, not having a body qualified enough to absorb energy anymore, was struck with disbelief at how much pain was afflicted to his entire body; while Kikaz (only partially astonished by the eruption of energy) counter-flowed the vigorous catamenia of energy. Dazanra, weak from recovering paralysis, struggled to hold the menstruation, and for an instant the current completely froze, both casters gradually tempering at the same pace. The energy expired, as it had no movement and both casters fell into a sullen coma.
Nero took a flask that he had kept hidden from Fikar and the twins. As he swallowed the bitter fluid, his secondary vein stretched hazardously. Nero pressed his forehead upon his original body’s brow, accumulated energy and recopied his brain’s contents into his former self. Nero soon fell into a coma too, and now laid in his own body, beside the limp body of Tezre, that would never harbor life again…
Kizox, desperately vexed of what the noises outside were about, crept out of the vent and entered a field of energy that wasn’t moving, he was confined in place. As the energy faded he began to fall, as it vanished, he landed on something. He looked to see Dazanra preparing to choke him. As Dazanra choked Kizox, Kizox struck Dazanra’s temple, causing them to both to fall unconscious as Kizox’s body lay to rest.
Fikar was confused and his ribs felt much pain against his heart, he lacked blood pressure and so so soon he was becoming delirious. As he watched a light fading outside he started to see the vent closing. In the darkness, he hallucinated that the narrow vent was becoming a box, it started to squeeze, he yelled but he didn’t hear anything. The box lit up into a rainbow and slowly everything dimmed into nothing, Fikar rolled in fear and something pulled him, speaking deeply, Fikar fell into a deep sleep…
Kizox was the first to regain conscious, as he looked around he saw that he was in a gloomy room. One doctor sat beside the bed he lay in, while as he looked around he saw that Kikaz had another doctor beside him. He gazed on to view 3 doctors around Fikar. He kept looking around to see 4 doctors talking over Nero. As he stared on he saw laying on bed next to him Dazanra.
The doctor standing next to him turned around and said in glee “Good morning, I’m Gron, now I would like to know about the conflict last night. It seems to have been quite hectic, as there was one casualty in the battle, last night. So what happened?”
Kizox stared at him dully, he was thinking, so confused. As he thought, he wondered what else had happened. He kept looking at the doctor. He thought hard and started remembering fragments of the event last night. As he put the puzzle together he realized that one of the female doctors was taking a knife out and preparing to cause a homicidal wound to Nero.
He yelled in rage as he lunged out of the bed and slammed the doctor off balance. The doctor spun around to slit Kizox’s neck but Kizox was fully awake now and stole the knife from the doctor’s hand and positioned himself beside the wall. As he did so one of the kisasian doctors focused. Kizox soul bonded with Kikaz, Kikaz received the message, Kikaz stirred, the kisas shot a ray of energy at Kizox, Kizox dodged the ray, the ray chased him, he tackled the kisas, the kisas lost concentration, the other doctors lurched at Kizox, Kizox dived for the door, the doctors chased Kizox, Kikaz’s eyes opened, Kizox broke down the door, the door landed with a loud thud, Kikaz jumped up reflexively, the doctors pushed Kizox down, Kizox shouted in variance, Kikaz gazed over, the doctors pulled the knife out of Kizox’s hand, Kikaz threw a weak energy ball at the doctors, Kikaz feinted back into his unconscious, the doctors let go in disarray, Kizox ran out of the room.
The doctors turned around and prepared to kill Nero. Kikaz’s thoughts still thought of Kizox’s transmission. As it had pondered on what to do it decided to run on minimal brain usage (like a computer’s safe mode). As Kikaz subconsciously lifted from the bed, the doctors looked over, Kikaz walked over to the doctor with a knife mechanically, the doctor with the knife aimed for Kikaz’s throat, Kikaz kicked her in the knee cap while grabbing the knife, the doctor drew the knife out of Kikaz’s hand, with no reluctance, Kikaz’s mind raced to find an alternative option, the other doctors held him down, the female doctor prepared a slice to the throat, Kizox ran back in and charged at the doctor, the doctor slit Kikaz’s secondary vein and shut his brain down from its automatic mode with a blow to the head, Kizox grabbed the doctor and her knife. As he walked to the wall he put it to her throat, he was holding her hostage.
Kizox commanded “Free my brother and Nero, heal the fikos and keep the other kisas unconscious. Any disobedience will have the consequence of me killing my captive. Understood?”
The doctors mumbled in a low hum the word “yes… ”
As they prepared to get up Kizox yelled “Crawl!… line up here!”
As they crawled over to him like slaves he ordered “Stand up, one at a time, and look at the wall opposing me!”
As they followed the orders Kizox looked for a secondary vein, and when he saw one he would pull their heads back to slice it against the sharp blade of the knife. When they were done that he ordered “Put out your arms one at a time!”
As the doctors did this in an orderly fashion he disabled their muscles with slices to their muscles. As he did this he told them with authority “Lay down and face the ground!” As they did so, he kneeled down and put the female doctor’s throat just above the knife as it slithered through their legs’ muscles.
Kizox then yelled “Bandage your wounds but don’t go near the runes!”
As they did this he cut the hostage’s muscle’s and her secondary vein, as she was a kisas. He threw her to the floor and told her to follow the others. As she scurried after the others Kizox went to the rune cabinet and collected some runes to add to his rune sac. As he looked down the rows of flasks he found one that was labeled multiplier he also took 2 boxes labeled energy tonics. He walked over to Kikaz and slowly poured one portion down his throat, remembering when Kikaz had gotten gravely ill on Nizo and Kizox had to create a mush to feed him for the twelve days he was sick once. He picked Kikaz up and set him in a soft bed.
After doing this he walked towards Nero and gave him a portion also. Then he walked to Fikar and looked at him. As his eyes scanned Fikar’s wounds he saw that Fikar was in critical condition. Kizox walked away from Fikar, his only hope that Nero would wake up and know what to do. He marched to Dazanra and raised Dazanra’s head. He slit Dazanra’s vein and followed it with the disabling of his muscles.
Kizox walked to the door and pulled it up, as he poured the multiplier rune on the cracks of the wood, and as he hoped, the liquid cloned itself into wood. The door sealed, Kizox walked by the group of doctors and looked at them laying there with bandages over their wounds. He picked up a bar lock and carried it over to the door, when he reached the door he put the sturdy bar on the lock holders. He went and sat down on a bed and thought.
As he sat on the bed he looked at the knife and wondered where the doctors had put all the weaponry. As he gazed about he noticed that one of the doctors was sliding towards a drawer, he immediately shot up and hollered out for the doctor to stop. As he reached the drawer and opened it’s largest shelf he saw all the weaponry and the two encyclopedia’s pilled on top of each other. He turned to the doctor and hissed “Go into the corner nearest to the group and stay there!”as the doctor obeyed the order Kizox ripped off the bandages on the doctor and threw them on the vulnerable wounds. Kizox then waited on the bed with the inventory.
He sat there watching the doctors, thinking of them like savages, planning to murder those they mend. As he thought he heard a bed mat rustle against the dry hay. He looked dully at Kikaz and gave a grin as Kikaz looked about confusingly at the surroundings that were only vividly written into his mind. Kizox walked over to Kikaz and sat down on the mat, he had a large explanation to tell.
“Kikaz…These people tried to kill us…I have my reasons…I can’t explain it all…You have to trust me…They’re dangerous…Nero will know what to do…”
Kikaz looked at Kizox and looked around himself to see his setting again, to let it sink in. Kikaz lay down and moaned in exhaustion “I’m going to take a rest…” Kizox walked over to give Nero another energy tonic.
He was tired…He had a headache…He was confused…his memories were fuzzy…he couldn’t remember what he had just been doing…he began to remember the alphabet…he started to remember how to move…he began to remember his vocabulary…He visioned an odd looking creature…he thought ‘fiend’…he visioned a fikos…he wondered why he thought Fikar…then everything started to flow, his memories waved in…he had regained his conscious. Nero had awoken…
Kizox got up and yelled at the doctors “Now you have three people watching you!”
The doctors looked over with a grim face and lay on an area they had swept clean with bandages. Nero looked about and saw Dazanra, he expressionlessly asked “Did you kill him?”
Kizox replied with the same tone “No, I just took away any threat he held. I acted as I saw fit, but now you can take control.”
Nero gazed around, as he caught sight of a doctor, he took off his mask and stared at the doctor, mesmerizing the doctor in trauma. He got up, broke the bondage but engulfed the doctor in fear of what he might do to the doctor. He stood their for a moment and lazily told Kizox “We should sneak off this boat in one of their smaller crafts, we’ll take Dazanra with us, the doctors can stay here, by time they mend their wounds and escape we’ll be gone,”and with that Nero strode to the cabinet and set a sound resistant rune at the door, “there…”
They had waited until night fall, once sounds from the deck had been quiet for a while. Then they put the doctors in an oblivious state of mind by giving them a slight overdose of pain killers. Nero cut a door way out from the wall, allowing the kinor brothers to drag him to an emergency escape boat. Nero took Fikar with him on a medical bed with wheels and a shelf with Nero’s chosen flasks and runes. The twins hurried along while Nero, with his bird eyes continuously avoiding any deep cracks, chose the smoothest path for Fikar. As the twins eagerly followed Nero’s instructions on how to reach the emergency deck, which he had studied on his way to Kizo. Nero kept his ears alert to every unusual sound, he tuned out the ocean waves and the large oars and focused on anything like foot steps.
The 93 meters they traveled (which took 1.45 minutes) seemed to have taken an hour, but they were still safe. Nero silently told the twins to set Dazanra in the boat after setting it in midair, as they did that he sawed off the legs of the hospital’s stolen bed and laid it in the side pouch of the boat, his eyes evaluated the condition of the small craft, its bottom support rail was a young and well-furnished plank of oak and would snap of age before it would rot from the salt of the ocean water. The side paneling had an old furnish that needed to be done again, but it was still above minimal requirements. The paddles were locked securely in their sockets, only a tiny gap in-between the boat and the paddle and a pale was in the boat to empty it of any water that entered it. It passed his evaluation and he set Fikar in its emergency patient pouch. The twins sat in the boat and got comfortable, but Nero told them to grip the bars tightly and for them to sit on Dazanra. He knew he had the most difficult part to play in this split second occurrence and focused. The boat was secured by 9 thick ropes, one folding the bow. He took his katana and swiped one loose, the twins realized what was going on and adrenaline pumped their veins even faster, strengthening the grip they held. Nero slashed all but the center rope, each cut rope tensing the twins’ muscles, he lunged his katana at the rope and with a single movement locked it in-between the paddle and the boat while gripping his bar, the boat plummeting the entire time, falling 5 meters down, into the ocean, the boat fell faster and faster and the twins began to lift up from their place on Dazanra, holding on to the boat upside down. Fikar pressed against the pouch, Dazanra was less fortunate and flew up into the air. Nero’s katana sliced through the paddle wood and the paddle flew up with Dazanra. Nero began to lose grip and was burrowing his claws into the wood when the boat dashed through the water and filled the gasping mouths of the twins, but Nero had foreknowledge on what to do and let go, swimming to the surface, breathed in only to be pushed back down into the water by a corps, Nero gasped in shock, but he had to focus on containing his instinctive reflex to direct a flow of energy towards what had hit him by surprise. Then as fast as he had been pushed down, he was pushed up. This whole event took only 9 seconds(3 in the air and 6 in the water).
The twins had focused by the 6 second and swam up, only to have their feet kick the raising boat, then Kikaz hit his head on Nero. The boat came up, flipped from the weight of the water and held the twins captive, Nero grabbed their feet and detached them. Fikar had breathed little and lay in the pouch still, but his squeezed lungs had filled with water and he now had pneumonia, too. Nero hurriedly flipped the boat back to its original direction of facing and spoke what he thought “Kikaz, drain the water! Fast!,”Kikaz quickly obeyed, “Ok, Kizox, can you do CPR?”
Kizox looked at Nero with a puzzled look. Nero understood that Kizox didn’t now what CPR was and told Kizox “Blow into Fikar’s lungs and keep on doing that with the rhythm of my pushing.”
Kizox frowned, but followed Nero’s odd orders, Nero pushed on his heart, Kikaz finished draining the water and asked “Need any help?”
Nero kept pushing with his own heartbeat and replied quickly “Start rowing the boat to a secure area on the side of boat.”he pushed nearer to Fikar’s heart and felt his snapped rips, he had just found out that it was an even bigger problem then he had thought he knew about, he knew the CPR wasn’t having its full effect, only a trickle came was coming out, he knew they would have to give Fikar professional help, “we need to get him to a hospitable, we should latch our boat to a secure side, we’re going to be here for around 40 days.”Nero continued to give CPR slightly above the heart.
Kikaz found a safely sheltered area, Kizox put one paddle in the dense mush of zebra muscles and took the rope in Fikar’s sack to tie the boat to one of the wooden nooks. While the twins attached the two boats together, Nero slipped off Fikar’s shirt. Nero could see his chest glazed with dry blood, smeared by rubbing the blood, his spine was crooked and he could see a large bruise, the source was under the blood. But the blood was still moist, a puddle on the left area of his chest. Nero opened the shelf and took out a skin multiplier flask, he set it down, he took an anti-bacterial rune, an anti-pneumonia flask, bone glue and a case of calcium tablets.
Nero scraped off the blood and followed it with the anti-bacterial rune, he glued the ribs together and he then quickly poured the skin multiplier on the border of where the ribs had torn Fikar’s flesh. He partially dissolved the calcium tablets into the anti-pneumonia solution (he required a heterogeneous mixture because if it was a homogeneous mixture it would become toxic) and trickled it down Fikar’s dry throat. Nero then laid Fikar’s shirt under his damaged spine.
Kikaz fastened all the knots, then wedged the free paddle into one of the crevices, pushing the boat against the side. They measured whether the huge oar handle would hit the boat and estimated that they would be alright, they would only get a minor splash. Nero, on the other hand, analyzed it for a long time and took into account where the oar shafts were rotted and how much they would effect the rotation, after a few seconds Nero cut off an area of the bow with his katana, a few centimeters ahead of where he estimated it to land…
They had sat on the boat and watched the oars hypnotically press forward, the waves splatter over their bodies, triggering a cold chill through their spines. Fikar lay their, Nero spent all his time mending his wounds to keeping Fikar alive. When they got hungry, they snacked on the zebra muscles that surrounded them. Fikar was fed zebra muscles after Nero tore the shells off of them and crushed them into a paste, mixing them with nutritional supplements.
They sat there, listening to storms from their sheltered den. They heard the waves splashing with glee, gradually raising in vigor and sprawling across the ocean with a rage unsuspected of the minor waves they once were. The waves had been exceptionally aggressive for the past few days, thrashing about without mercy. If the ropes hadn’t been supporting their escape boat, they would have been drowned long ago within the distant waves…
Dazanra had been put on the side of the boat, Kizox and Kikaz didn’t understand why Nero was keeping Dazanra aboard, but they did know that Nero was intelligent and knew more then themselves. They had fed him the leftovers that had began to rot and left him as was, they had left him alone, playing chess on the board they had engraved and using well decorated shells for the pieces.
Kikaz was gazing at the massive oar when he saw Dazanra stir in the corner of his eye. He spun his head around and yelled instinctively “Nero! Dazanra is awake!”
Nero turned quickly, yet relaxed in posture, locked eyes with Dazanra and walked over. As he sat down beside Dazanra, he told Dazanra “I am no longer the warlord of Zovna, Dazanra, but I still have my skills,”Nero sighed to collect his thoughts in an organized order, “please cooperate for the time being and understand that you are outnumbered, warlord of Serval.”
Dazanra looked up and asked “Where is Tezre?”he looked about to search the boat, “Did you posses him, Nero?”Dazanra stared up at Nero in demand.
Nero held the stare and replied formally “I acted in necessity of survival, as I would have been slain otherwise.”
Dazanra looked at Nero’s healing wounds and understood that Nero had a point, but he was enraged by the death of his loyal companion. He looked away at the oars and for the first time his eyes dampened because of death’s cruel chain. He hadn’t cried for the death of any of his highly ranked officers, barely flinched, and only because they always played a key role in his ambushes, but here he was having his eyes blur for a bodyguard. Though he had known Tezre since he was 15, Dazanra was now 36 years old, so Tezre was a friend. But he wouldn’t lash out at Nero, Tezre had fallen of the beam of life when he attempted to nock Nero off and so this was to be accepted and he would move on.
The twins believed that Dazanra was up to a plot for revenge, so they only pretended to play chess, but really watched Dazanra incase of any suspicious acts. After a few hours of staring at Dazanra stare at the oars they got bored and started playing chess strategically. Kizox won after leading a unit to Kikaz’s left and immediately striking Kikaz’s right, leading into an assault lead by Kizox’s queen at Kikaz’s core military base and leaving Kikaz’s king vulnerable, after those three consecutive ambushes, Kikaz had been doomed to lose.
After 35 days, Dazanra spent his time gazing away while the twins got bored of chess and started passing the time by trying to make one that was were fair, intellectually strategic and luck free. They made many of them, Nero helping them to improve their strategic thinking, make them more alert and substitute what they would have learned at Zovna.
As Kizox was thinking deeply and swiftly, he had been for the past hour. At this moment though, he was deciding on which way he would secure his trap and defeat Kikaz, the oars reversed, he moved his knight’s unit into Kikaz’s back gate. Kikaz had centralized most of his units at the front lines to keep a defensive hold at there, but left a vulnerable back door. Kizox attacked the fortress, Kikaz fell for the trap and finished off Kizox’s knight’s unit at the cost of Kikaz’s anti-rook unit. This was only to be counter struck by the two bishop units. The boat stopped as Nero got up and swept Kikaz’s fortress off the board, one of the few ways to get the twins focus at climaxes in their games. Kizox yelled in fury at Nero “I had Kikaz cornered! You idiot! You ruined our game!”
Nero calmly yet hurriedly replied “We’re at Sharoz.”
Dazanra got up and told them expressionlessly “I will be leaving now.”Dazanra weakly raised and limped away from the boat, disappearing into the fog. The twins picked up Fikar, Kikaz in the front and Kizox in the back, and followed Nero, who had an atmosphere of knowledge of Sharoz.
Sharoz was in a tropical climate zone and was covered in thousands of huge networks of water, swamps and marshes. Therefore, Sharoz was always fogy in Nez-95 to Nez-85, a season attained when Synava was facing the sun at an angle of 85 to 95 degrees. It only dried at Nez-0 to Nez-15, Nez-0 caused severe solar damage to the swamps and marshes though.
Kikaz and Kizox chased after Nero as quickly as possible, but Nero was running too fast for them and they ended up taking a wrong turn, a turn into a dense mesh of tiny bungalows that were more the size of small sheds. Kikaz yelled to Kizox “Wait! I think we lost Nero!,”Kikaz slowly turned around to look at Kizox, both of them were in complete shock as they realized that they didn’t know what was going on, they now knew that they knew less of how the world worked, “What should we do?”
Both the twins walked in-between a bungalow and a large building to rest from anxiety. As they sat down and laid Fikar comfortably, they sighed. They were exhausted, even though they had awoken only a few hours ago, the sun had moved approximately 0.5 centimeters in all the time they were awake. Kizox pulled out a pocket sized purse, which he had crafted with zebra muscles dried skins, and asked in a daring tone “Play me?”
Kikaz stared at Kizox in a perplexed manner, but finally said “Aw, what the heck! Let’s play.”
They both yelled simultaneously “I’m white!,”They both knew that Kikaz had called first, as their brains could now measure time by a tenth of a second.
Later, they would fall asleep in the deep colonization of Sharoz’s most populated metropolis, Shik, darkened by the sun shield laid over the city to protect all the sleeping shadons…
Nero had forgotten about the two kinors and the fikos at the moment, his mind full of remembering the correct route to the clock tower’s market. His neck soar from being crooked so long, remembered that he did not require his mask. He took it off and let his neck feel straight and let the air cool the perspiration that had seeped under his neck, a rash had turned his emerald green scales to a harsh bloody red(from scales pealing and the rash), yes, he knew that this is the way he should be allowed to live. He finely reached the clock tower, remembering that soon he would be most likely be in the middle of a fight that he either caused or just had more bad luck…The official gangs that pretended to be guilds would be coming out to claim the clock tower as their territory at the “official”time, or for them when the clock struck 90 o’clock. He stared at the beautiful 720 lines that marked each degree and semi-degree. This beauty was what he always saw, even when he was thinking on where to go, but at last he saw a vent and walked towards it. As he opened it he saw that inside was a duct leading down and a tremendous wave of heat. On the vertical wall was written ~If you come down here to kill me, reconsider because this is the only entrance that does not have a security lock and it leads into my light sealed furnace that is always receiving extremely flammable yet long burning fuel-. He thought for a few moments and a plan formed in his train of thought. He grabbed hold of some mud that had absorbed the moisture and packed the vent with it. He then put an energy field that blocked air from going through it over the vent, waited a few minutes and then slid down the duct. Success, as he had thought, the fire had dyed by a loss of oxygen and now he was hidden in a maze of ducts that heated the entire house. His sandals blackened by the medals heat and his body prepared to hold in all the water it could. He shot a wave of energy to counter the heat, somewhere else he heard heavy droplets echoing from far away. His blood began to expand and his heart pounded. He heard a yawn come and someone mumbling. He heard a soft liquid trickle down a pipe and more mumbling. He realized what was happening and screamed in horror “No! Don’t start a fire!”he sent a wave of powerful energy to the furnace and heard pressure being compressed as he maneuvered it to push a hole in the metal, the metal cracked and the liquid seeped out and with it went Nero’s conscious…
When Kikaz awoke from his nap, he saw that their was a group of people talking to Kizox, who had an expression of gladness. Kikaz got up and walked over to the group, who looked over at him and nodded. Kizox took a stride towards Kikaz and with glee told “Kikaz! these people are going to help us get Fikar to a hospital!”
Kikaz had to register in his mind what Kizox meant he ran over and picked up Fikar with Kizox and they followed the group, the group of people followed the path to the clock tower and went to a house with a golden bell connected to the door so that if you opened the door the bell would warn of intruders. One of the females in the group told them “The doctor is in there, we’ll defend the tower here so you’ll be safe while we defend our establishment here.”
Kikaz, not understanding what they were saying looked at Kizox and he looked at Kikaz, but not with confusion. Kikaz commenced a soul bond and after the few moments of stabilizing the information swiftly loaded into Kikaz’s brain. He learned that Kizox had been abducted and interrogated and had to prove that he was not part of a guild. When he finally proved he asked if they could help Fikar, which they had gone back to see what condition he was in as they observed the condition of Fikar they told him that there was a clinic near the clock tower. As they negotiated on payment for the bills Kikaz had awoken, so they finished that they would pay if the twins defended the tower with them for awhile, they would even have a place to sleep in the tower as long as they acted like members of the guild, temporarily.
Kikaz and Kizox went into the clinic with Fikar. On the outside the clinic had been a titanium box and no other descriptions could be given, but the inside was much more cozier, chairs sat in the corner to be sat on with the walls painted dark red, a gold colored grid pattern was sprawled across the red. A note was on the oak counter beside the bell, it read ‘Ring bell for service’ Kizox tapped the bell, but no response was given so he rang it repeatedly until a frazzled shadon came to the desk and yelled “This clinic is not open for ser-!”the shadon gazed at Fikar and opened the door in the wall that was not apparent to outsiders and said expressionlessly “bring him in here, don’t mind the other person in the room…”
Kizox handed Fikar over to the shadon and responded “We have to help the dominant guild now, they are paying…”The shadon nodded as they turned with their hearts pounding, no longer did they have control of what happened to Fikar…
Kizox walked deeper into the density of shadons, arrows and fog, Kizox at this moment had his first glance of two guilds fighting over territory and was shocked at how different a mob verse mob battle was from a one on one battle, his mind raced for new strategies, in his perceptual vision he saw a white figure racing towards him, a bloody sword in his raised hand, the door opened, Kizox jumped away from the shadon as the shadon lunged at him, Kikaz walked into the square in a daze just like Kizox had, Kizox pounced upon the shadon, the shadon slashed his sword at Kizox’s arm, Kikaz focused on the shadon, Kizox stole the shadon’s sword, the shadon pulled at Kizox’s hair, Kikaz shot a bullet of blue flame at the shadon, Kizox ducked, the shadon dehydrated before bursting into flames…Kikaz fell down, in shock of his first time murdering a foe, he began to vomit and blood flowed from his nostrils.
Inside the clinic a mutated form stood inside and waited for his host to return, and as the clinic returned Nero saw Fikar’s feeble body, at once he stood up, ready to ask questions, but the shadon explained without being questioned though, “I think your twin kinors have just entered our politics, they are defending the tower at this very moment outside…”
Nero didn’t need to excuse himself, at once he left the building to find the twins and protect them from the enemy force, he hadn’t taught them guild verse guild combat yet, only how to be a strategist. Were they prepared for mobs?
Kizox, with his arm bleeding, raced for Kikaz, this battle was not made for a wizard. As Kizox kneeled over Kikaz, pinching Kikaz’s nose, a cold rush of pain rushed through his body, his body started feeling a numb warmth. He stared at a blade, thrust through his body and most likely piercing his organs, rainbows speckled across his vision and blackness began to fill his sight. But Kizox wasn’t ready to let his conscious fly away, he got up, turned around, stared at his foe and punched him in the stomach. The victim returned the deed, and as Kizox fell over, pulled the sword out of Kizox, blood gushed out of the slit and he could no longer keep his conscious with him, it fluttered just at his finger tips but never came down into his grasp…
Nero raced out of the clinic and into the crowd, Fikar was safe in the clinic but out here the twins were on the brink of death, always. Someone charged at him, only to be blasted away into the crowd. He looked about, but the fog was dense in the dome. Nero spouted a beam of light about the room, dismantling the fog and burning the shadons before he saw two limp kinors on the ground, he flew towards them, picked them up and flew up to the clock tower’s gear room, the clinic had been locked but he knew they would be safe on a gear with a horizontal axis. Nero laid the two down, shaking Kikaz awake.
“What is going on?”asked Kikaz
“You used pure magick…”replied Nero
“Is Kizox safe?”
“I saved you both… He seemed to have been severely injured, after the battle we should bring him to the clinic…”
“He only had a gash on his arm when I blacked out…”
“Someone stabbed him right through his stomach…”
“…Can you explain pure magick to me?”
“Alright, it is a more refined magick, what did you generate?”
“A fire ball…”
“Those take a lot of energy, especially if you don’t use them right…You made fire with pure energy, the safe way is to take some wood or flammable material and pulse the energy into it, the energy then is sent to the target, material included with the kinetics.”
“I don’t think we helped.”
“Why did you chose to help these people?”
“They said they would pay the fees if we helped them defend the tower…”
“They’ll do that, and if the enemy gets in here we will be here to stop them, but next time don’t get into these type of politics…”
“Why is my nose bleeding?”
“Your brain needed so much blood that it overflowed and drained the blood by using your nasal exits, the easiest and shortest path for the blood to drain.”
“Has that happened to you before?”
“I use magick a lot, so yes, but my mind is very advanced and it rarely happens…I would have to blast a wall of flame across this entire area. One of the times I almost killed myself was when I flared a wave of pure energy across an entire war zone, me verse an army, I won, but I laid passed out for a few days…”
“You’re a supernatural Nero…”
“Thanks, most people call people with that much power fiends…”
“I’ve only heard of people who could do that in legends, I have never met someone like you before…”
“Your social life never had a chance to flourish, Dazanra has the ability to change the air currents, he likes to summon storms to give his opponents harsh conditions…”
“You could do that”
“I suppose…”
“When did you first start using magick?”
“Once I was born.”
“Aren’t children not able to use magick?”
“Well, I never really was a child, but as you said, I’m a supernatural…”
“Ya…I never really knew much about magick until I met Fikar.”
“To think that we have only known each other for only 54 days.”
“Will Fikar be alright?”
“Fikar is in the hands of the friend I wanted to meet, the one I mentioned on the boat, he is safe with Huetai, the doctor.”
Doors slammed and Nero jumped up, opened his sack, handed Kikaz the dagger and unstrapped his katana from the seam.
“The offenders have broken into the tower, use the dagger to defend yourself, I’ll handle this.”Nero quickly yet politely commanded.
And off Nero went, the ring of diamond clashing against metal could be heard throughout the tower, but never once was a scale even scraped. At moments a pause could be heard but the collage of sounds continued on with an explosion and a wave of heat. The battle was against Nero in numbers, but in power was evidently bias for Nero. Soon enough reinforcements charged in, Nero retreated higher up the tower, to mend to Kizox and protect Kikaz. He ran in, saw the foes who had ran farther into the tower and had found Kikaz. Nero slashed the swords out of the shadons’ hands and slashed at one’s throat, the others just ran in fear of death.
“Some of them ran up the stairs to the top floor.”Kikaz nervously reported to Nero.
And off Nero was again, leaping up gears and sending jolts of electricity at his foes, his katana clashing against the swords of his enemies. And he came back, leaping down the gears and guarding the runts, but none came up, for the battle was over…
Nero sat with Kikaz in the clinic, Nero was not worried because he knew Huetai had cured wounds much worse then Fikar’s. Kikaz on the other hand knew nothing of Huetai’s abilities, causing him to be very anxious.
“Kizox will be fine.”Nero reassured Kikaz.
“How are you so certain?”Kikaz inquired.
“Because the clinic here is Huetai, the friend I came here to meet, and he has cured people in worse condition and studied as a doctor with a 100% average by the end of his education. He is the best doctor alive in Synava, many say he should be labeled as a god, like Tyr the chemist.”
“Nero, what did you mean when you said ‘I never really was a child’?”
“Something I wish I hadn’t told you, I’ll tell you one day when all this is over and we will be on more friendly terms, not dependant terms.”
“Can you explain why you need me?”
“At first it was to obey my master’s order of dominating this district, but corruption enters those with power and he stopped thinking of the people, but of his own wealth. So I quit, while being expelled, and hurried off to stop Fikar. He is my right hand, he wasn’t best suited for the job but his loyalty lies with me more then Zovna’s master. So when I told him I had been expelled, he knew that he was also expelled and therefore would help me with my plan to defeat Zovna. You and your brother have a very special ability, which is why I’m surprised they labeled you as runts, because you aren’t. You are gifted.”
“I thought we were weak though.”
“The kinor definition of the word ‘runt’ is:One who is abnormal by a large extent. End of definition, so you see, because you are more powerful, you are abnormal, which makes you a runt.”
“Then am I stronger than Dazanra?”
“No, he is a powerful kisas, but later on after some excessive training you will be.”
“And Kizox?”
“He is also powerful.”
“How did you get your katana, it looks valuable.”
“I made it myself when I lived on Zixra.”
“How did you make it that sharp?”
“Magick”
“That must have taken a long time.”
“It took a lifetime.”
“Did you make the runes?”
“Yes.”
“Your life must be so exciting. I wish I had stories like you, I was born and sent to an island with my twin brother, the end.”
“The island must have been interesting.”
“I guess it was sometimes.”
“Besides, this is the story you can tell others now.”
“I guess. How old are you?”
“Very old.”
“But you are so healthy and nimble, mentally and physically.”
“I’ll never pass my prime.”
“How do you know that?”
“My cells only multiply into stronger cells, not weaker. They also generate at a stable rate.”
“So are you immortal?”
“Through natural death, yes.”
“Your never going to die.”
“Death is always looming above me.”
“How many times have you almost died?”
“How many times have you breathed?”
“Ever since I was born.”
“That is your answer.”
“You have been safe at one point.”
“Never have I not been at risk of dying.”
“But not once have you died.”
“Maybe I have.”
“But you are living.”
“Now.”
“How do can you enter reincarnation?”
“When you die, you brain energy lives. My energy is attracted to the Gate of Souls.”
“But wouldn’t it be dispersed?”
“Not if the energy is strongly connected.”
“So when you die you are reborn?”
“Somewhat, my short-term memory is deleted.”
“That is all?”
“The path to the top of Zixra isn’t safe, the energy isn’t stable.”
“Who taught you how to combat like the way you do?”
“Who taught you to breath?”
“Myself”
“There is your answer.”
“You are a good fighter.”
“That is why I was a warlord.”
“But you said it is just strategy that maters.”
“And I can do that also.”
“You’re a good chess player.”
“Just playing with my strategies”
“Did you ever lose a battle while serving Zovna?”
“When the generals thought my plans were not coordinated well and they started the ambush early or they did something else that I hadn’t planned for. A few times I had ran in and improvised, whenever I reached them on time we didn’t have to retreat.”
“Did you ever retreat during a one on one battle?”
“Never, unless I died, but I wouldn’t remember that.”
“I doubt you’ve ever died.”
“I’ve died a few times.”
“How many years has it been since you last died?”
“Much longer then you’ll ever be alive for.”
Silence set into the room for a few minutes…
“Kizox is going to be in there for a few days, Fikar longer. Do you want to see Sharoz?”
“Only the exit.”
“If only you would see the greatness of Sharoz…”
“What is in this slum?”
“More then you think. But that doesn’t matter, because we are going to have another long walk through Sharoz, to their northern port.”
“Can’t we find an easier way?”
“We could take a carriage across the continent…”
“Why not? We’re rich! Fikar and Kizox will need to rest too.”
“Okay, but only if you come and look around Sharoz with me.”
“…Fine…”
“Let’s get going then.”
And the entry bells jingled as Nero and Kikaz went out the door…
The town of Shik is either seen as a wonderful colony or a violent mob of barbarians. The central square held many markets and was not a residential area, while the farther you went from the square, the more farm land you would see. Sharoz had a dome build over the entire continent to block the sun, this caused an excess amount of moisture and warmth. Everything that lived in Sharoz was nocturnal, the plants were actually one plant that grew in the center and had broken through the top of the dome. It blocked light from entering but it grew tall outside, distributing its photosynthesis with all the little offsprings, in return they gave it the water they absorbed and it uses that to grow more. If you were to hold a light to the ceiling of the dome you would see a pale green layer of leafs and moss growing on it. The dome had been build thousands of years ago and was now slowly decomposing, but the vine has already molded into the dome’s shape so when the dome has fully decomposed the dome will be a coil of vines, sheltering the nocturnal animals and collecting sun light for the little plants. The little plants weren’t very little though, on the surface they were a few centimeters long, but their roots had grown through the crust of the earth and then they began to grow up to the dome, where they would join the coils of vines. On the shore where the dome isn’t covering because of the weakness of the beach’s foundation, the vines grow on the beach and delve into the sea to generate energy with the salt, not the sun’s light. The farm lands harvested the tiny grasses in light chambers that used crystals to generate the light, the sprouts would use this light to generate energy and send it to the mother plant.
The farmers would pick a few leafs and roll them up to be sent to the markets. Because this process took a long time, the vegetation was very expensive, this caused the shadons to have evolved to have razor sharp teeth for eating meat.
“This is nice, I think Sharoz probably could be a nice place.”Kikaz told Nero while inspecting one of the sprouts.
“Are you happy you came with me?”Nero rhetorically asked, “But on other concerns, would you like a nicer and less expensive way of getting out of Sharoz?”
“Maybe, what are you think?”
“Remember the mother plant I told you about?”This was another rhetorical question, “Well we could take a carriage near there, just off the restricted zone and climb it, once we reach the top we could slide down the dome.”
“That climb seems like it will be long, and the slide would be rough, but okay.”
“Fikar will be in a trolley, Kizox should do fine.”
“Alright I’ll look forward to it.”
“We should be going back, Kizox should be in some bandages by now and conscious.”
“This was a good evening, the markets are nice.”
“They are, but when you get, for Kizox’s sake, wait until tomorrow morning to talk with him.”
“Okay.”
And as the clock hands let the inner world know that outside the sun was setting, the tired workers and farmers set off to be with their families. Nero and Kikaz set off down the road to the central square and only knew that it was late because Kikaz was getting tired and the miniature clock towers along the road.
As they walked down the road they saw all the nice things, to Nero they had always been beautiful, to Kikaz they were just starting to be noticed. As they walked they heard footsteps behind them, Nero first and he was first to look back at who was following them, it was Dazanra.
“I see you are still staying close with the runts, but where is the other runt?”Dazanra inquired.
“Dazanra, I am no longer your enemy. I have been expelled from Zovna. We will be allies later on, I am going to Zixra to start my own guild, will you aid us or not?”Nero calmly replied without answering the question.
“You will always be my enemy.”Dazanra responded.
“Will that be the same when we find ourselves fighting the same army?”
“Always.”
“You will never be certain of that.”
“Once we are enemies we will always be.”
“Then when Zovna comes to ambush you, I will not be there.”
“We will not be conquered.”
“They still have my plans.”
“You think you are the most important asset to them?”
“I was truly the master, I let Virk feel like he was free from the strings that held him in my grip.”
“Then why are you expelled?”
“I tugged to hard and he found a pair of scissors.”
“Then you were planning on attacking us?”
“You could say that, or that we were going to make you surrender.”
“We would never.”
A bolt of lightning shot through Dazanra, with no resistence because of the surprise. On the ground lay the shocked form of Dazanra, his nerves in spasm and numbed by the immense shocks of electricity that were scattering about his body.
“Run!”the already running while vomiting Kikaz cried out to Nero.
And off they went, to the clinic…
Once Nero and Kikaz reached the clinic, they locked every lock on the door and shut every curtain.
“Alright, get off to the spare room on the third floor and go to sleep.”Nero said with exhaustion as he also went to a spare room on the third floor.
In the morning, when everyone was up, Nero went to see Kizox. The room wasn’t black, only the patients with illnesses that needed their eyes to rest had black rooms. But Kizox’s eyes could handle a red room that had murals of the healing gods. In the room Kikaz sat beside his brother, passing him his water and doing little things that helped a lot. Kizox sat in a fluffy bed with bandages that were carefully sanitized around his wound. The bandages were red, but Huetai had told him that they shouldn’t remove the bandages because blood would start rushing again and that the bandages would absorb more blood if they were new.
Kizox looked up at Nero and whispered with difficulty “Good morning.”
Nero gazed at Kizox, his crimson hair blending with the walls.
“Rest Kizox, you are in no condition to be giving customary greetings. On the other hand, Kikaz, did you read the book Fikar gave you?”
“I’m on chapter 6:Alchemy, they’re talking about how protons and neutrons and electrons all work.”
“It is a theory that Tyr found. He wrote that chapter, he’ll explain how you can make a plant grow twice as large. It is very advanced, so you should only linger on it if you want to be an alchemist. But it is going to be breakfast now.”
At the table, Huetai brought out some boiled dark chicken eggs, which were white as the dark chicken is an albino.
“I boiled these eggs with my tonics.”Huetai proudly stated to start conversation.
Nero continued the conversation with a new topic,”They taste good, but when do you think Fikar will be healed?”
“I looked over his wounds, I think he is going to have to stay here.”Huetai responded mechanically.
“…Okay.”
“What are we going to do?”Kikaz asked curiously.
“Leave when Kizox is better.”
“Why?”
Huetai answered this question for Nero,”Because Fikar is going to take months to cure.”
“Can’t we wait?”Kikaz inquired provokingly.
“No, we are in a rush.”Nero answered while eating the pale yellow of an egg.
“Why are we in a rush?”
“We need to act with haste before Zovna gets back on track.”
“Explanation?”
“I’m Zovna’s ex-warlord, when a guild loses its warlord it is very unorganized. During this window of opportunity, many guilds attack the guild, who’s master must take on the warlord’s responsibility, get another warlord and still deal with his own responsibilities. I’m hoping that we can attack him during this time.
But it is almost impossible to exploit such a small area of time when we haven’t even created a guild. In any case, it will take years for Zovna to recover from my lost because they will have to adjust to a different person’s style of combat. Then there is the group who agree with me, and will either resign or have a lowering of moral. It is very complicated, but it all sums up to the fact that the guild is more vulnerable once the warlord is subtracted out of the formula.”
“So we should be going in a few days?”
“Kizox will be ready to go this evening, but you should leave in the morning.”Huetai answered while taking the dishes to a pile of dishes that would, by the end of the day, be washed in the town’s creek…
A few days passed and Kizox had just a bandage tied around his waist, it was good enough for Nero. Kikaz had explained to Kizox that they were going to the mother plant and everything that Kizox had missed of Sharoz, so when Nero started explaining everything, Kizox just nodded and said “I know.”letting Nero know that Kizox already knew.
Nero had arranged a carriage ride to take them out of the town, past the dominant guild’s turf and into a smaller turf. Once they were a few miles away from the mother plant, they would get off and walk.
Later that afternoon, the beating of an albino horse echoed in the distance. A door opened, out came three people and they entered the horses carriage. Off they went, down the road in silence, waiting…
Nero looked out at the few little sprouts, one of the prehistoric plants of Synava, of the planet. Those few sprouts were the oldest organism of Sharoz. They never died, they were like Nero. They were miracles and they had only frail little snubs to prove it. But they surely absorbed a lot of water every day, sucked out crystals’ energy, took in the soils nutrition and held the Sharoz’s continental plates in place. Many said only Sharoz had these sprouts, but Nero believed that Sharoz was just the mother of these vegetables and that the other continents had the flora growing down into the bottom of their own plates. The sea around Sharoz definitely had the vines seeping down them.
The two twins talked about many different things, like what it felt like getting a sword through your stomach, what they had done in the past few months and other things to pass the time. They went on about their opinion of some of the events, but when they didn’t even want Nero to hear, they soul bonded. Nero listened to their conversations, sometimes they would let him join in, but he found they talked to unpredictably.
“Kizox, how are you doing with the encyclopedia?”Nero asked Kizox when he started changing the topic with Kikaz.
“I’m on chapter 6:Archery Techniques, I don’t think I’ll need to use a bow, but Kikaz says I should read it.”Kizox replied.
“Yes, I guess you should listen to Kikaz…”
The rider of the carriage opened the wall and ordered “Get into good posture and be quiet! We are crossing a border, only respond if the border guards ask you a question.”
“Alright, we understand,”Nero replied as the wall shut, “I’ll handle this, only talk if they ask you something, listen to what I say and go with whatever I say.”he now spoke with a tone of urgency.
“Okay.”the two twins responded simultaneously.
The road continued for awhile before the carriage stopped. A metal fence bordered the perimeter, as metal was cheaper then wood in Sharoz. Iron towers were placed at gateways, they held the guards, let travelers know where the gates were and allowed them to see people coming before they reached the gateway.
The passengers sat in silence, waiting, when they heard a yell and a person being thrown on the ground. The carriage was pulled through the gate. The door was then opened roughly, guards pulled the three out and tied their hands. He explained with a harsh voice “We have dropped passage with the clock tower, we will verify your origins and decide if we will let you come into our territory or if we will have to execute you.”
The three prisoners, which had just been three passengers, were led into a circular room. A bench was welded into the black room, the three were sat in the bench. Nero was taken through a door that wasn’t visible in the darkness.
The guards presented Nero to the commander posted to this gate. The shadon was a sturdy one, he looked powerful and held a vibe of authority. Nero sat down, his eyes illuminating the room, his brain intensifying the luminance level, and waited to be interrogated.
The shadon picked up a clipboard and began his interrogation, “What is your name?”
Nero thought for awhile, and decided that he should tell the truth only, “My name is Nero.”
“…Are you a shadon?”
“No.”
“Then that means this list of questions isn’t important,” The commander set down the clipboard, “Now then, your origins are probably out of Sharoz, but are you the Nero that was here about fifty years ago?”
“Yes.”
“Who are the two others?”
“They are two Kinors who I’m bringing to Zixra.”
“You aren’t staying as long as you were before?
“No.”
“Alright, you can continue on. How long should it take you to get out of this region?”
“A day or two.”
“I’ll give you three.”
The commander handed Nero a three day safety pass, the date was sketched on the top of the slip.
“Thanks.”
Nero got up, left the room and when he was out of it he told the twins while showing them the slip, “We have three days to get out of this region, so we should get going.”
“Okay.”the twins both answered.
And they were off in a rush to get to the mother plant within three days…
The three hurried off, not stopping for any rest until nightfall, in which they laid down on the ground. The chillness of the soil seeping into them or, to be more exact, their energy was seeping out of them, as cold is only a lack of heat, and heat is just energy. Therefore, heat can be thought of as a noun, and coldness as an adjective to describe a lack of heat.
Eventually, Kizox got up, told Nero that they should just keep going and reported the news to Kikaz after Nero agreed. By the morning they could see a glow, a green glow. Nero told the tired twins that it was the mother plant, so much energy was being flowed through her that she emitted a glow, along with the strings of light that had squeezed through the tiny cracks between the thick vines.
By noon they could see the whole plant, Kikaz regretting to have ever thought of climbing it, Kizox hoping his stomach would be okay and Nero marveling over the greatness of the giant vines. They walked on, and a few hours later, they were at the mass overgrowth, their heads tilted back, looking at the height they planned on climbing.
Nero grabbed the two by their arms and lifted off, his bat wings flapping faster then a humming bird, he flew on until the twins started slipping and his wings started aching with the excess weight of the twins and the altitude they were reaching. He landed vertically into the mesh of greenery, as it was becoming green at this height. He bit a vine, sucking in the sugary juice that flowed through the plant, and told the twins to do the same. When they were finished, the plant recovered from the minor dents they had put into the plant’s skin.
Nero grabbed the twins again and lifted off again. When he got tired, he repeated the process of landing into the mother plant, drinking the sweat juice and resting before blasting higher up the plant. As he was nearing the summit, the air became more and more like pure oxygen and the mist cleared. Eventually, they reached ceiling of the dome, where a hole was filled in by the vines. Nero focused before releasing a beam of dense energy, the plant was pushed aside into the ceiling, the ceiling crumbled and the three climbed up the tunnel as fast as they could while the plant moved back into its original posture.
On the roof of the dome they saw the vines had completely covered the top of the dome, Kizox dreamily remarked, “It is beautiful Kikaz.”
“I told you.” was the response Kizox received.
Nero grasped their arms and flew off, going horizontally before descending into a steep dive. His wings curled into a cone, his head a narrow tip. Thousands of kilometers they needed to travel and their speed was gradually increasing, Nero accelerated by taking advantage of gravity and aerodynamics. He scanned the surface for a landing point and decided on the swampy beach, he tilting towards the beach and when he was a few hundred kilometers near the ground he released his wings into a parachute, drifting down upon the mossy beach with vines sinking into the salty waters.
The twins stood in shock, recalling every moment they had just experienced with a soul bond. Nero, as he had done this before without carrying two people, got up and headed for the harbor nearest to this beach, the twins hurrying after him…
Once Nero reached the harbor, he shoved his mouse finger into the steel dial set on the diamond coated titanium door of one of the few small ships floating in the harbor. As he turned his finger in a quick combination of left and right turns the high pitch sound of diamond clashing against diamond could be heard slightly, until finally Nero pulled out his finger and opened the door.
Inside, the ship looked less secured, as the boat’s exterior was made of titanium, coated with diamond. The inside was still titanium, but a rug was laid on the floor and the walls were varnished. A light casting rune shone dimly on the ceiling and was set in a box that’s bottom slid underneath the light, to let one sleep. The boat was small, it only had two rooms, one lounge and one control room. The lounge had a one-person bed, an armchair and a rocking chair. The control room had levers for the sails and a wheel to aim the thruster runes.
Nero gazed about dreamily, reminiscing some old memories. He walked over to a shelf and stroked it with his paw while explaining, “This is a ship I made, five back thrusters, three front thrusters and a frame that can take cannons.”
“So we are riding this ship until we get to Zixra?”Kizox asked with a slight tone of disgust.
“Yes, and it’ll be better then that cargo ship we illegally boarded.”Nero replied.
“We weren’t suppose to board that ship?”Kikaz asked with a voice of guilty nervousness.
“Well let’s see; we boarded the cargo ship without a permission slip stating that we could legally immigrate, I have a warrant stating that I can be killed in reward of 100 000 diamonds, and you two are being looked for as runts. Yes, we are permitted to just go over to Sharoz, another continent and make a guild on Zixra.”Nero answered in a completely sarcastic voice full of annoyance, “But on to other matters, please read while I prepare the Sea Dragon.”
And a door opened…And then it closed. A bag opened, and then it closed. A book opened, and then it stayed open.
On the deck, where the engineering was visible, Nero could see that everything around him had signs of neglect. He cleaned the drainage tubes, readjusted the metal wires, tightened the screws and bolts, polished the gears, recharged the energizer, washed the window, reinstalled the excess energy cannons, straightened the thrusters, polished the exterior, shifted the cargo for frontal weight, checked for rotten food, rationed the food supply, tested the radar compiler, planned a course to Zixra, filled the water bottles with the mother plant’s juices, packaged some of the mother plant’s vines, checked the weather conditions, rechecked everything, test ran everything, started up the engines and started off for Zixra.
While Nero did these tedious tasks, the twins read up to Chapter 7:Using Your Surroundings (both were titled the same), played chess and then looked at Nero’s geographical maps of every area in Synava (even the aquatic zones). The maps were at a scale of one centimeter by one centimeter square equals one kilometer by one kilometer square ratio. After analyzing the maps, they organized the maps so that you could make a map of Synava without difficulty.
By then Nero had set everything up and estimated the direction they needed to go in order to reach Zovna the quickest. So he came into the inner room to see how the twins were. Kikaz was the first to react, by getting up and asking “Where did you find all those maps?”
“I have been to every continent and have been taught by some of the best map drawers, those I drew myself.”was Kikaz’s reply.
“You drew every part of Synava?” was the shocking reply Nero received by Kizox.
“Yes, when you have as many years as I have had in your life, you find that things that never change get boring, you know what is going to happen, but geography is something that is always changing. I have swam to the bottom of the ocean and measured its floor, I have flew up into the sky to find out what way the jet streams are going and I have climbed every mountain to get its height, and measured its circumference repeatedly to measure its average slope angle. I have recorded the fauna and flora of every ecosystem and seen them all evolve, how the only two things that haven’t died, in the sense of not being revived, is the mother plant of Sharoz and me, a race so unknown that they classify me as a spiros. I can remember when the shadons were just starting to become paler, when they started to build their dome. I remember when the humans came in their metal cones and interbred with the other species of this planet and tried to join us with their federation, a union that has dispersed now, and how the technology they brought was banned, for the way it mass murdered. I remember when a meteor hit Synava, the crater has become flatter, but it is still an indent. I remember everyone thinking of it negatively of it, but I saw it as a great package of resources. I remember when the skullkas were only two meters tall, but they made a law to refine their race, and now they are two and a half meters tall. I have drawn maps like that many times, those are the most recent. This ship is my portable home, the other one is at the peak of Mount Zixra.”was the very long reply to Kizox’s rhetorical question.
“How long have you been alive?”asked Kikaz.
“I haven’t died for the past five thousand years, the first time I was recorded in history was about forty-five thousand years and I’d estimate about five thousand years not being recognized in history, so that would be about fifty thousand years of memories.”
“Where are your other maps?”Kizox asked curiously.
“They are preserved with an ointment and kept in my home at Zixra, only the most recent maps are kept here, copies are at Zixra.
“Can we see your home when we reach Zixra?”
“Your unknowing of Zixra makes me smile, and yes, it is the best place to hold refuge, but I plan to make a main fortress to have quicker action.”
“Can you explain your plan?”
“I can, and I will, I plan to make a different ranking system, I will be Master of All, you and Kikaz will both be a generals, working with the same unit, and would lead an ambush on Zovna, from there I would not show up as a general, but as an anonymous mage, then change into a soldier to get closer to the fortress and then into one of their soldier’s costumes to enter the castle, then change into a messenger and get to the new warlord, from their I would kill him and change my identity into his, from their I would enter the main room, and when Virk gets up I would throw a beam of energy at him, he would send it back, with more vigor and I would reflect it into his chandelier, it would shatter, so I would reflect the shards at him. From their we would commence a battle. If I become doomed, I can escape through the hole that would be in his ceiling.”was the long reply of Nero’s.
“Well thought of, but what if something goes wrong?”Kizox remarked.
“Improvise, I am a warlord with more then a thousand years of experience, I have improvised many times, I rarely am defeated.”was the brief reply of Nero’s, “but it has been a long day, get to sleep, you two can fight over the bed, I’ll just take the rocking chair…”
The time spent on the Sea Dragon was repetitive and slow, much time was spent playing chess or studying. The sea always looked the same, a few large waves could be seen sometimes, but the sea was very repetitive. They studied a lot, Nero taught them architecture and with the plentiful supply of paper, made blueprints for a keep that could hold many people, defend itself and pretty much be an efficient point. They even finished their encyclopedias, both heard the others entirely, so Nero showed them his shelf of encyclopedias in the pilot room where there was two books missing.
After a few days, Nero became slightly anxious, and stayed in the pilot room. The waves were a bit harsh and the twins wanted to see outside. When they got into the pilot room, Nero was pulling the thruster levers and sending an energy reserve to the excess energy canon. They looked outside and saw in the distance a very thick curtain of vapor covering the sky. Nero turned to them and quickly filled the in on what was happening “Dazanra is chasing us down, apparently he had a unit with him in Sharoz. They are coming to get us and it would be easier if you two could help me, Kizox, you take the canon. Just aim it towards the enemy ship, do not hit the water though, that’ll probably overload our boat and don’t shoot the clouds because that will just charge the storm. Kikaz, I need you to distribute the energy, give more energy to Kizox when they are getting to close, if they are faster then we are, give me more energy. If we need more energy, charge the system yourself. I’ll be charging it too, but I can see that they have a better model and that our wires will burn out if we power them too much. I’m going to steer this ship. Do you two understand?”
The two answered “Yes”while hurrying off towards their destinations.
On the Servalian Cruiser, the sailors worked furiously to catch the Sea Dragon. They put the wires to their maximum capacity of energy for the thrusters and had the energy canon set to the most condensed mode and fully charged. With them came a storm that was under their command, Dazanra focused on the Sea Dragon and opened fire on it.
The Sea Dragon countered with full force, a constant beam was set on the enemy boat and their canon overloaded before exploding, which cut off the circuits. Quickly the thrusters of the foe had began to recharge and the backup canon was installed. Again they were overloaded and this time the energy beam didn’t stop, making a surge of energy overload the fully charged thrusters, triggering more electrical explosions and a boat that was filling up with water. That is when Dazanra played his trump card, a bolt of lighting. The Sea Dragon received a shock from the direct hit and the canon went out of order, thankfully it was off and had sent its energy to the reserves, so the reserves were extracted and the thrusters had been isolated by the advice of Nero’s, knowing that Dazanra was going to zap them. From their they reconnected the thrusters and Kizox began to replace the energy reserves. Nero steered the Sea Dragon straight to the other ship, running over the sinking ship as he continued northeast for Zixra…
Dazanra woke up in the lifeboat that him and some of the higher ranked crew had taken, the others were on some other boats that had been directed back to Sharoz, and from there to Kizo to call for reinforcements. His ship was headed for Zixra…
The Sea Dragon was much faster, with their thrusters and continued like normal, but instead of studying architecture and geography, they studied engineering, electrical circuits and other tasks they had used in that brief battle…
The seas of Zixra are very different from the seas of Sharoz. You would think that they did not have much difference, but they do because of a strong air current that reverses the tide, and from there the water system is isolated. Inside the air current, the waves are very harsh, and they go towards a current that goes to Sharoz. That is why many sailors end up getting caught in it and back at Sharoz, which is also why there is a port at the place current’s end because if you are headed for Sharoz from a place that this current intercepts, then this is the fastest way to Sharoz. Unfortunately, the Sea Dragon was going to Zixra. So Nero, and the twins after looking at the currents on the maps, had made a path that would cross with two islands. That gave an easier passage through the current and a place to restock on food.
A few days later, the two islands were visible. They were flat, from the wind, but the sand was enough to slow down the current. By noon, when the tide was low, the islands were higher and the current calmer. It was at this time that they reached the islands.
“Keep the thrusters low, the river takes a few sharp turns and is very narrow.”Nero advised Kikaz.
“Alright, but where are the fish?”asked Kikaz.
“On the shore, around the middle where the water is calmest.”was Kikaz’s answer.
It took a few hours to reach the middle, but once there, Nero ordered the thrusters off.
“Get in the water, the fish stay here and have developed. They have no predators on this island,”Nero continued, “I’ll go and collect the fish, we can’t take too many or the ecosystem will die.”
“Okay, can we go on the shore?”Kizox asked.
“Sure.”Nero responded.
In the water, Nero set his sight format to compensate for more aquatic conditions so he could see better in the water and propelled himself with his wings, his head pointing straight to create a sub-stream so he could accelerate and then hold his wings horizontally to decelerate his speed and grab a fish. The fish were large and translucent, the only camouflage gene they had left. The last time Nero had noted them, they still had teeth, small teeth, but now they had no teeth. That way they can have more mouth space open to eat the microscopic algae that multiplied faster then the fish ate them. Nero took about ten fish and then decided he was done.
On the shore, the twins looked around the island. It was a very simple island, no seeds had reached yet so it was all beach. On the shoreline, it was greenish with algae, but as you went farther, the sand got drier because the water came up only at night, and there was no shade to keep it cool. The sand was not hot though, the wind kept it cool.
Kikaz was first to break the silence they had had since they stopped talking about the way the environment worked here, “Maybe we should head back to the boat, and layout some of the seeds in the fruit Nero has.”
Kizox answered this, “Sure, the island could use some plant life to hold the sand here.”
So the twins went back, chose to use apples because the trees might hold up to the wind and went back onto the shore, planting a seed every ten meters, a quarter of a meter deep, and when they reached the center of the first island, they did the other island. Nero had waited on the boat for them, redrawing and taking note of how the island had changed, until they got back.
“What took you so long?”was the first thing they heard while he finished taking his observations.
“We planted all the apples because we think that the islands are going to get flattened below see level without plants and that then the fish would be washed away.”
“Good idea, though you should’ve given the island more variety. I look forward to the next time I come here so I can see how it worked.”was Nero’s response.
And they set off, evening was closing in and the tide was high. The twins went to studying and Nero continued piloting the ship…Chapter 34:The Zixran Sea
The Zixran sea is very unpredictable, this is because the perimeter is very strong from the outer current, this causes a domino effect by effecting the inner layers. The jet streams shift a lot too, because of the extreme temperature changes. Zixra comes within Nez zero rarely, it stays within ten to eighty. This causes the year to be very shifting in temperature. That may be why Zixra has such a low population, as you need to be able to endure most of the Nez scale. Because of the large Nez factor, the jet streams shift. Then you have the moons, though Kizo is the continent with the oddest tides, Zixra still has a problem with tides. From there you have the gravity of mount Zixra, though the moon has more gravity then this mountain, it is close to the water(most of Zixra is the mountain). When you add all the odd factors they make the sea unpredictable…Especially with the mountains and volcanos below sea level…These eruptions normally caused a slight earthquake, Zixra’s base to raise, a rock slide, tidal wave, whirl pool and from there a small hurricane. Fortunately, Zixra’s environment was isolated above ground. Unfortunately, beneath the sea’s floor, Zixra was connected. This usually caused a slight shockwave to pass through the continents and shift the plates slightly farther, with minor tremors in unstable territory.(except for Sharoz, because the Mother Plant was firmly settled in that plate and held it down. This may be why Sharoz is the closest continent to Zixra.) And at the other side of the planet, a tremor because the shockwave clashed there.
Nero was prepared, he sailing in the Zixran sea before he sailed in any other. Zixra was his home. This was where he had lived, learned the cruelty of people, learned the generosity of people. This was where he had been killed first, this was where he had been born, and born again. He could already see Zixra, you can see it from a very far distance.
“We are almost there, it should be a few more hours if we pilot well, set thrusters to maximum power, send the canon’s energy banks to them. Use the canon as a wire…Kizox, you set it up while Kikaz powers the thrusters directly at the back of the boat. I’ll steer, I know these waters.” Nero started in a rush to reach the shore by tonight.
The twins didn’t need to respond, Kikaz knew where the thrusters’ energy sockets were, behind the bed, and Kizox knew that extra wire was around and began to install another energy path to the thrusters. They wouldn’t be sailing at the wires’ maximum capacity, they would be sailing at the thrusters’. This took an hour to complete, the wires were exterior and would be made interior later. Kisas had a few energy tonics and a bucket to toss out the vomit.
A lot of hours later, when the moons were raising, they were reaching Zixra. It normally took more then a day to cross this sea, but with the thrusters’ new power and the advantage of knowing the currents, they had gotten to Zixra with a few hours to spare…
Zixra is known for its eruptions and tidal waves, many people would rather live in Sharoz with its unstable borders. Even some of the original founders of Zixra dislike and are forever trying to get the funds to move to another continent. I could easily support their view, or just as easily disagree. Instead, I will give you an unbiased report on its geography.
Most of the Zixran village, as there was only one village, was on the inland shore. There they can reach the water without being dangerously close to it and not to close to the mountain in case of an avalanche. The sand on the Zixran shore is not sand, but rocks and cooled magma. This is the result of all the rockslides and eruptions. If you dug down a few meters, you might find some signs of sand existing underneath all the layers of cooled magma and stone. The shore is not very large though, most of it is under the water.
On the terrestrial zone of the shore, there is no large vegetation. The plants are all small shrubs that hold onto the magma, so the waves can’t pull them into the sea, while also being able to shrink into the hollow area of the magma they create with their roots in order to not be effected greatly by any volcanic eruptions. In the aquatic zone, it is mostly algae that grows and mosses. A few other plants grow under the water, using salt instead of sunlight for photosynthesis. Some of the Mother Plant’s sprouts had begun to infest the deeper areas and it could be seen on the shore sometimes. There is very little aquatic fauna, a few shrimps and some frogs. The frogs lived in the mosses while the shrimp and other shrimp like fish swam farther away from shore.
As you go farther forward, less cooled magma appears and the soil becomes more rocky. The flora is still small because of avalanches and has the same anti-lava function, but becomes less water resistant. The plants will contract at a high vibration rate, in case of avalanches in order to be even more safe. The life on the earth is more plentiful. Wild cats and reptiles live in the fields, a few types of hawks existed, living most their life on the ground though.
Then you have the Mountain of Zixra…It has an area of about 50km2, with a kilometre of height, that is why most of Zixra is Mount Zixra. The continent is only about 75km2. That means that only 25km2 is field area, that is only 1/3. 2/3 is mountain. The mountain is not empty of life, a river of fresh water flows down Zixra. Many birds roost in the cliffs and plants can grow close to the ground(going up). In the upper part though, less life grows there. Some evergreens(mutated to grow only a few centimeters)grow in the snow and some other glacial life does exist. The snow on the top(most of Zixra)is what keeps the river flowing with water. A bit before the heat stops to raise, there is a very hot area, even if you are in the shade. Many who climb the mountain fall off due to dehydration.
One of the worst parts of Zixra, leading to its high rate of international poverty, is the lack of essential resources and ability to communicate. They do however, have a large supply of diamonds and other volcanic produce. Because of the low land value of Zixra, guilds are unstable there also. Most guilds start up in order to tax the people for funds. Then the master and elite personal take a ship off to Juroz or some other stable continent.
With this information in hand, many can see that Zixra does not have much in it. But a potential does exist, the people must only cultivate the area and dig down Mount Zixra for more area.
Once the ship hit shore, Kizox was already running off to observe the ecosystem, Kikaz was a bit unsteady and Nero was configuring the ship.
He called “Get over here you two, we need to hull this ship inland! The tide is going to raise by midnight and this slope will have any wind or avalanche send The Sea Dragon off to sea until some volcano erupts underneath it. Kikaz, you pick up anything that will get in our way, the magma is smooth enough that me and Kizox should be able to get it inland with these wheels and other utensils made for the terrain of Zixra.”
Kizox, farther away then Kikaz, still reached The Sea Dragon before Kikaz. Kizox looked at the boat, now more like a carriage, and asked “So we push it?”
“Zixra has a large slope towards the sea. If we push it, it may be pulled onto us by gravity. Therefore, we are going to pull it with a pulley, I’ll set it up while you help Kikaz clear the ground until you two reach flat land. That will be where the pulley is placed.”was Nero’s command in a response.
It took awhile for Nero to empty the ship so that it would be lighter, he had tied it to a crevice in the magma, but the twins were still told to put up a barrier behind it. The pulley was very sturdy, it was tied a few bushes and had two lines that were connected to long levers, each was to start pulling once you sat on one end of the lever. By time the twins had cleared a path, Nero had finished the system and began pressing down the first lever. Once it landed he locked it in place before telling the twins to switch lines. Once they finished connecting the second line and only after that, disconnected the first line. Nero locked the line, raised the lever and then pressed the lever he had raised. The boat came nearer. And so it went until the ship reached the pulley system. They decided it was safe enough there, but built a wall in case of an unexpected event.
Zixra’s only village, Zixra, is not a dense area, even though the only other communities of Zixra are hermits. The village of Zixra is more then ninety-nine percent of the total population. And its population is only about three hundred. Most of those people work their lives trying to leave a large estate for their children, or to leave Zixra.
The problem with the economy is that everyone is poor, and everyone gains money at about the same rate. In this fashion, the money becomes less valuable at the rate that people make money, and that makes everyone stay at that level of wealth. There are no rich people, and because everyone is poor, there are few poor people, in relative terms. Any rich people can afford to leave Zixra, and that makes the currency go down even more.
Nero was a specialist in many fields and had looked at Zixra’s economy and what they had to work with. He had thought of a plan to raise their economy. First, he would donate a portion of his wealth to them. Then he would make a business that payed well in the mining industry. He would move from there to cultivating the land and educating the people. Once he had their trust, he would build forts and plan an attack on Zovna. With most of Juroz, he would be able to set up trade and work on stabilizing the economy. There were a few faults in his plan, but he found that good plans never work because they were too fragile. He liked to improvised more.
This place was where they were headed, a poor slum many would call it. But the area had little competition, so nobody would attack while preparing. And so they walked, Nero knowing where the town was by reviewing his mental maps. By the evening they entered the small village, more a vast field where people worked on there poor crops that were drained from years of usage, only growing enough to get by. Nero walked on the bare road, by the few side passes until he took a turn into a field growing wheat. By time they reached the shack the sun had set, and a slightly red lighted rune hung in the window. Nero knocked on the door, waiting there calmly. It opened to reveal a young lady, her hair was cut cheaply short and she looked at Nero with slight recognition. He formally answered her unsaid question with “I am Nero, a good friend of your parents, may I come in?”
The door shut, then locked. A little ruckus could be heard in the house until the door opened again, this time the host was an old man. He asked “Nero my friend, must you always appear at the time in which you have almost been forgotten?”
“No, but I guess I’m a very busy person, and my time to visit all my friend’s children is very short. Could I join you? And when are you going to refurnish that light, you know it is becoming blue. What will you do when it set your house on fire?” Was the response with a question.
“I have it attached to a string, attached to a metal hook above a bucket of water.”
“Well, I think we should start some alchemy here…But, may I stay here with these two kinors?”
“My house is open to you for any day, Nero.”
“Thank you.”
Nero walked in, the twins shyly behind him…
“So, what brings you here?” Berlin Kred asked Nero once they had sat down.
“Juroz’s plans to take total control, my plan to create a guild here and some other events.” Nero responded.
“I’m afraid we are dealing with a guild right now, the community is starting to plan an attack on them.”
“Perfect, I could use something to help them with, Berlin, how much trust do you think I’d gain if me and these kinors took down this corrupt guild?”
“A lot, they’ve been trying to tax us…”
“Good, tell the people that this new guild is going to be…not replaced but…banished by the immortal Nero…”
“Yes, that will give you some trust, and I’ll help you because I know that you will not betray us.”
Shortly before midnight, with the moons making a bar across the sky to cause it to be the brightest night in years, Nero and the twins headed for the local castle where the guild was heard to be making plans. It was an abandoned castle, the first guild had made it. They had not been corrupt, as guilds normally were on Zovna now. It was designed to hold off an attack, and had many fool-proof locks and other systems, or so it was thought to be fool-proof. But Nero knew the map of this castle very well. He knew how each lock worked and how to break it, what each walls weak points were and what materials were used to make everything.
By midnight, they had reached the old castle. Kikaz had headed for the window that could be unlocked after some negative charges, Kizox had came under Nero’s advice, in case they had to soul bond. Nero flew to the higher tops and started working on pulling and loosening the roof’s rocks.
Inside, Kizox worked on finding the armory, remembering the maps and following the path he had made, they had to hold it off so that nobody could get weapons, but mainly so that they could stock up on weapons and most likely runes. Kikaz watched for any of their new enemies. They finally were at the corner to the armory, when Kizox took out a few shruikens that curved and some more that went straight, he grasped his dagger in his mouth for quick retrieval. Kikaz got the message, guards were placed there.
A piece of shrapnel came flying into a guards face, another in the other guards face and then Kikaz and Kizox were running forward, Kizox tossing the shruikens into the guards knees and Kikaz electrifying them. Once they reached the door, Kizox stabbed the guards with his dagger and quickly started to turn the combination lock slowly, listening, with Kikaz’s groaning, for any clicks it made. Eventually when he pulled on it like he had for some time, the door opened. Kikaz placed himself in front of the door as Kizox searched through all the weapons and collected all the rune sacks.
Nero had gone through five layers, he knew that this was the last one now. But it was the mot difficult, he needed to choose the right one for all the bricks to fall instead of just letting a moon beam into the room below and giving his enemies a warning. He revised where all the beams were and where the weakest rock was, pulled it out while beginning to hover, the ceiling collapsed right into the dining room, where the meeting was being held. He spread his wings and let himself fall slowly, intimidating the crowd he was to face. He landed, stared at them and shot one without looking at him and the victim fell over, gasping in his last conscience thoughts, his brain having been overloaded with energy.
“You know I could do that to every single one of you weak minded humans. So here is what I have to tell you, and you can follow what I, Nero, tell you, or you can choose to die.” Nero said in a monotone voice he knew would intimidate the all, them not seeing him with any emotional weakness or showing signs that he would hesitate. “You are going to go home, and live quiet lives. I am going to take over the responsibility you don’t have the capacity to handle.”
Each one of them ran, Nero following them and any who took a wrong turn were soon no longer living. The crowd moved quickly for the entrance, their hearts beating furiously. Eventually they came to the door, and when it opened up, a large mob was waiting. Nero smiled slightly, he had not known that Berlin had been so wise in getting everyone to come. Nero decided to let the people choose the correct form of justice, that is what law was for. He set a wave of kinetic energy into the prisoners and they landed into the mob waiting for them, they did not live very long, but they were lucky in that fact.
After all of this Nero stared out at the mob, they were slightly refreshed and he decided that they trusted him by now, “Hello, I’m Nero as it is rumored and I’d like to know if you will except me to help you. You know I can be trusted and I have a history of 50,000 years of loyalty to Zixra and if you are not newly immigrated,” a sad chuckle went throughout the crowd, “Then you probably have some point in time where I helped out your family,” the crowd nodded in memory of how Nero had saved them one year or another, helped tend the crop, help with a house save them out of a rockslide or some other sort of dilemma, “So, will you except me, trusting with past knowledge that I will help you, unlike most guilds here to exploit you and run away from here, like the group that has ceased to exist only a few moments ago?” The crowd was in obvious approval. Nero was now the master of Zixra…
A legitimate vote was taken the next day, and only a few voted against. Nero took up the castle, rebuilding and perfecting the building to resist Zovna. The economy rose a bit, Nero had sent word bidding Huetai advertise Zixra and buy any Zixran herbs he could use. The turf Huetai lived in followed suit. But Nero needed more help, he needed to bring in his friends of international business. They were human, all profit men he did not meddle with. The type who will cut your throat for some spare change always ended up betraying you, it had caused the death of him before. He sent more messengers off, loyal friends he had on Zixra that he knew would come back. In a few months businessmen from all the neighboring countries were coming, including Juroz.
One day, an unscheduled guest, a fikos, came. He demanded seeing Nero. The guards would not let him, but he persisted that they tell Nero that Fikar wants to see him. The guards sent a message, and Fikar was immediately summoned.
“Hello Fikar, how was Huetai?” Nero asked after they were left to converse in private.
“Fine, some guild paid my expenses. Though it would have been free otherwise.” Fikar responded.
“Yes, the twins were a little naive on that point, it got Kizox a scar in his stomach. I have had some talks with Kikaz, he seems like he is more docile then Kizox. You have been out for awhile, so while you are still well and healthy, I’ll fill you in on my analysis of the twins. First I will have Kizox, he is willing to learn. He is very intelligent, but he is mainly into strategy, physics and other variables used in battle. When you went out, he took charge of the situation. The ship’s hospital had you and was apparently preparing to execute you, so he battle the doctors out and took a hostage. He followed through by cutting all the Kisasis’ secondary veins and slicing everyone’s limbs. He held them humble with an iron fist. That is hard to keep stable when you are young and out numbered. In the end, I would have dealt with it differently, but wisdom comes with age and he did keep us alive. He also seems to be very stubborn, not willing to give up till the end. He truly follows the human idiom, it isn’t over until it is over. At the battle of the clock tower he proved this well by defending Kikaz until he had feinted. He does show sympathy for human life, as he had not killed the doctors, but he also shows that he is willing to do what it takes to get ahead.
For Kikaz though, I found that he was more docile, easily persuaded and willing to help if it does not hurt him, even if he has nothing to gain. He is interested, and excelling, in all subjects and has read the encyclopedia you gave him, as did Kizox. He seems to be more timid when Kizox is around, I’m guessing this psychological effect happened while they were on the island, Kizox intimidated Kikaz because Kikaz did not know about magick and therefore seemed weaker then Kizox. I did have some time with him, and without his brother, when we were in the clock tower. He seems to want to help and accepts new ideas easily. I don’t think he could take charge as well as Kizox, I suggest we keep him with Kizox for their ability to soul bond and so Kizox can take charge as a unit’s commander and Kikaz can be his right hand. That gives Kikaz authority, but not the burden of command. What was your early analysis?”
“You’ve stated what I was going to say, though for me it was less evident.”
“Alright, so what do you think we should do with them?”
“I think that maybe we should do as you thought. But I believe that the unit should be a selected few who will sneak into the building as a diversion unit. That way, you can travel as they pretend to be the ones coming in to get Virk.”
“No good, Virk knows that I would not rely on another group of people to do the vital attack. Though we could have them ready to come in…Perhaps their telepathy will be tested. I believe that I will bring Kikaz with me, and if we have a problem, Kikaz will call Kizox’s unit, a selected few, as you said, will come in and reinforce us. They will hold our area, while waiting, in the general area…Not at where we entered though until Kikaz tells Kizox to move in closer. As we get closer into the castle, they move in. I want you to hold the main attack, at the front. That way they can not estimate where I’ll enter. I’ll have Berlin hold the back entrance, waiting for you to smoke out Zovna. We can have some other units take the sides, but they will not be part of the main play, mainly a wall and another hassle for Virk. We need to give him many little things to deal with. He is a smart man, and can solve a problem quite well. But when the pressure gets on him and he has to make many simple choices he starts to get frazzled.”
“Okay, sounds good to me…Who is Berlin?”
“A good friend of mine, I’ll ask him to come tonight. He has a mind for strategy.”
Berlin was called forth that day and introduced to Fikar. He was explained to about their plans of what they wanted to do when they when to Zovna. Berlin agreed to cooperate and started looking through the maps of the castle, both castles. Nero could trust him to hold a secure station.
Fikar was also brought to see the twins, Kikaz was the first to get out of his chair and greet him in great joy with a, “Oh my gosh, Fikar! Has it really been only a few months? How are you, please sit down.”
Fikar took the offer, as his body was still recovering.
“Oh, I’m fine, Huetai cured me quite well. And it took me awhile to get here, but it is good to see you two again.” Fikar responded wearily
“Well, we could use some help with this strategy.” Kizox added with a glance.
Fikar listened to the plan and looked at the castle’s maps. They looked throughout thirty floors of cobwebbed passages and chambers, estimating the safest paths to take and which drains Kizox could safely bust and which ones would be best left alone.
The plans were made, the frame was finished, the blue prints drawn. The gyro set into motion and only the ones who held it could stop it from spinning, but they must let it go at the right moment for it to spin correctly, and they had so little time that proper analysis of the variables would render the window of opportunity to be opened. But there were more then just one window, there were many. And some lay behind others. They all had to be opened at the right time, and in the right order…
The businessmen came and were sent to lounges to wait. Eventually they were all there, and that is when Nero decided to greet them. He walked in, staring at these men of currency. He opened his speech after planning it in the moments of how to persuade, “Friends, I thank you for coming and I believe you all know the risk of business. You and I know that you hold more power then the government for economy and many other factors. I have called upon thee to entreat you with a large and daring investment. I would like you to begin business in Zixra. I have made plans to make it quite a metropolis, and you would have the early foundation of Zixra. Unfortunately, if you decline this matter Zixra will continue being a hopeless continent. I know you are human, men of profit who still care. Will you not care for the Zixran people and all its potential?”
The room was silent, then Robinson stood up to speak, “If we invest into Zixra, will you invest into us?”
“Well of course, you know how investing works. I’m sure in your early days of business you hoped to have only a few grand of investment, and you were given it. You had brains and applied the money until it multiplied, and now you are some of the most wealthiest people in Synava. You know I have brains, and if you don’t then you do not know me.”
Etta stood up after this “I know your intelligence, you have studied for years, as you seem to be immortal. I do not put my doubt in you, but the people of Zixra.”
“Do not worry, I have already agreed to fund you and the people follow me, I am one of the few they trust. They all owe me.”
Karl stood now, “I think this might work, as long as we all invest. The only time investing fails is when the people you are handing the money to are idiots, which we all know is false here, or when not enough is invested. If we invest into Zixra, all of us, then we can probably have a monopoly on this place. So why don’t we exploit this opportunity?”
The group seemed to be nodding as a majority, most thought a few moments and just agreed, Zixra and themselves would gain from this. Another window was opened…
Kizox and Kikaz were in their sectors, looking through the maps of the enemy castle. The maps were that of the warlords, and therefore they held every secret vent and little weak points of the castle. The easiest point was where the catapults were, they had balconies that came out for wider range. The twins decided that when the shields opened, Nero could get into one, shoot down all the catapults while Kizox just walked into the castle. He would head for the intercoms and stop them, that would stop communications. Kizox would not have a unit and would also travel around, taking down the communication. Then Nero would glide in, and, hopefully, kill Virk.
Berlin also was called for strategy, as he was taking the back entrance. This was a common and vital point. It would be the exit, they needed to hold everyone inside, and reinforcements could not be allowed. Berlin was given a large unit, he was not powerful, but Nero had found that he had a honest eye for strategy and could command a large amount of people. He would hold defense at the entire back, unfortunately Zovna was in a hexagon. Berlin was given three sides, Fikar the other three sides. Nero was not going to command a unit, he was not a commander, he worked best alone. He only gave those he could trust the rank of commander. Kizox was going to get inside and give updates and cut off communication. Kikaz would stay with Nero until told to go to Kizox.
All of Zixra had joined Nero’s battle, he had near eight hundred and would be facing more then twice as many. He was to commence a battle of the wits also…
Nero began to organize his units, Berlin was given five hundred troops and Fikar three hundred. For more precision, Berlin had:4 alchemist, 10 doctors, 1 cleric, 5 scouts, 450 soldiers and 30 people who were prepared to take any tasks which needed to be done. Fikar had:1 alchemist, 3 doctors, 1 cleric, 10 scouts, 35 people who would do anything and 250 soldiers. This is against:1000 soldiers, 50 doctors, 10 alchemists, 100 scouts, 5 clerics and 500 people who were free to be given any job. All figures are rounded estimates.
But Nero showed no fear, he was not afraid of numbers. Statistics were against him, probability said he had no chance, but skill said he had a fair chance. Many knew of the numbers, but they felt encouraged by Nero’s presence. Nero had any able bodied people work on many ships to reach Juroz. Five ships were made, and while they were being done the alchemist were busy working with the smiths on rune blades. The clinics were making energy tonics and other tonics while the doctors worked on bandages and practiced their art. The soldiers were put through vigorous training, a few mages selected and some archers. Farmers were busy harvesting the food and many started mining at the points Nero thought were likely to hold the highest amount of loot. Nero sat back and rested, he needed to let himself be ready.
Half a year later, once all was prepared, the boats were made and everyone finished what they were doing, Nero took the twins and himself on his ship, Fikar and Berlin had divided their unit with the other boats. And off they went, they were at the brink of releasing the gyro.
The ride did not take long, Nero piloted about the seas and the boats followed him. Many took a rests and everybody waited, anxious and afraid. Afraid of death. Afraid of the torture and pain that lay staring in their faces. Afraid of the future generations that may be ruined. But hopeful of the greatness Nero may portray into their lives. They held loyal and were prepared to pay their debt.
Zixra had been abandoned. And nobody noticed except for the businessmen who already knew that it would be happening, as they would invest after the people returned. They were preparing to open many windows…
Juroz had a mountain range that covered most of the shore. A few areas were more hill like, but flat land was farther inland. The mountains held off the wind and water, so erosion was not at a very high rate. That led to more hills. It also held an abundance of elements like titanium and iron. Foundations were built by artificial erosion and then used. Mines were spread around the continent, to make it easier to erode later on and for selling purposes. The northern area contained minerals that were less dense. This caused less mountains in the area. Zixra was north of Juroz, and therefore Nero was heading for the northern area.
The northern area also held more people, as building a house is not difficult there. It is more humid and has more rain, which caused the erosion to happen in the first place. Father south, one will reach a lower ground as the flat lands are higher then normal. The lowest of these are marshes, and beyond them is Zovna. They give protection to the castle, slowing down there foes allowing their scouts to alert them in time.
The scouts had paths that would get them to Zovna as quickly as possible, making a relay system so that tokuru inefficiency did not interfere and the rested would carry on a message. They did not use message intercoms, long round pipes deigned to echo, as that would give the intruders an easy path and let them be able to send poisons into the ducts.
Zovna is a wealthy guild, as stated before, and built extremely well. It is thirty stories high and it’s halls were build like an ant colony, as they also went some stories underground also. Catapults were placed on the outer circumference of each floor, on balconies to allow slightly less then semi-circular aim. Physicists were placed at the catapults in order to have the highest accuracy. Intercoms were placed throughout the building, some private ones also existed like intercoms for the physicists to tell each other when the lower floor should take over. Their were many people placed in the intercom office, the core of communications. They directed intercoms with other intercoms and send out announcements.
The Zovnaian people flourished, harvests were plentiful and tools were supplied. The people helped each other, making sure that everyone succeeded. They held stable economy, spending enough to keep the merchants in business and keeping enough to keep supplying.
On past this guild, their was the one guild that had held off, as Juroz was almost totally owned by Zovna, and they were Jinva. Jinva had came to exist so that they could stop Zovna, and spared because Nero had fled. They had taken advantage of the chaos and stabilized, spreading out into small groups. Nero was prepared to plea for their help. And they would help knowing that Zovna may be overthrown with the help of another guild…
Nero’s ship hit shore. And all the following ships hurried to empty their cargo. Everyone was out, stretching their legs and hulling carts of food and water. Tents were set up and Nero had placed with him:Fikar, Kikaz, Kizox and Berlin.
Inside the main tent that night, Nero smiled at their dinner. Toasting with “My friends, we have a secret agenda tomorrow, and hopefully not tomorrow night. The people think we are going to Jinva, but Jinva has a tendency to be slow with decisions, they’ll take too long. The people think we have a large plan. But here in my hand I hold this well thought plan. You may have noticed that my plans have changed drastically, this is no plan. This is a draft!” with that, the paper that had been so hardly worked on was blackened to a crisp, the twins looked shocked, “but no, this plan would not combat what we are against. It will take your wit! I have aligned myself with all of you for this battle because I believe that you can be trusted. But not only are you trustworthy, you are intelligent and can make decisions. So I toast, for victory and the success of Kizox’s and Kikaz’s first real battle. They showed that they were prepared at Sharoz, at Kizo they showed more then you’d believe, even that they were willing to fight for what they thought was right. At Zixra they showed they could get into a guild. Now I tell you all this. These two are at an important point in their lives, they are going to show us if they really are ready, ready for life…” and glasses clanged as the twins sat in a slight shock.
The next morning, everyone ate bread and water before organizing themselves for the battle ahead. Berlin took his share early, as they needed to crawl around Zovna and Fikar followed a little while later. Nero waited until noon before taking the twins off to Zovna, he’d reach the field soon after everyone else had. Now was the day that Zixra’s fate lay in…
Berlin held moral within in his unit, the forestry was dense and they had to reach Zovna soon, they had around thirty kilometers to pass and then secretly walk around a guild’s main castle. Once he got there he would be fine, but now he had to make time he didn’t have. He started thinking he was lost, but he didn’t have that time either. He had to follow his mental map. He started jogging, that would have to be done. They couldn’t walk there. Perhaps Nero wanted him to hurry, but if Nero did then he would follow this odd idea. Nero had told him not to leave last night, to leave in the early morning. This would be hard.
By four o’clock, Berlin reached his destination. He would wait. Fikar had to blast in and start an attack before he would get into the battle. Until then, the clinic was set up and a temporary base…
By four and a half o’clock, Fikar reached the base as the sound of fighting could be heard, Berlin got up and had his scouts tell everyone what was going on. Then he prepared to charge in. Half a kilometer lay in front of them, fields where catapults would soon fire their boulders. Nero stopping this soon was all he could hope for. He had everyone convey along the horizon, as that would make less catapults have them in a range and have the catapults need to turn more.
They ran as fast as they could, running as rocks came flying into the field, then sparkler runes came flying in front of them and the organization started to die. But everyone kept running, the lights had also concealed them. But it cleared and they had reached the wall, as the catapults seemed to have stopped throwing boulders and runes. The wall was a haven still, and a large door of granite lay in front of them. They knew that the doors wouldn’t open for them, as the people inside were dealing with Fikar. Berlin stared at that the wall, smooth and strong. “I want you all to bash on that door, until it breaks in! Else we can try climb this wall.”
Everyone started to attack the door of stone. It wouldn’t move, but they had to get inside. The balconies were closing, as they didn’t want Nero coming in, he’d just blast the curtains. Maybe they could get through the balcony, if those walls had a way to get in. No, he’d wait for Fikar to smoke out the enemy.
A row of people covered the south wall, focusing on the doors. The clinic was called over and they started treating the injuries from the catapults.
Berlin began to be impatient. He needed to know if Fikar needed help, he sent scout. The scout returned in a hurry, yelling “They have canorks released! Nobody but Fikar’s unit and the canorks are there!”
Berlin had a problem now. He couldn’t wait here, Fikar was being ruined. But he would put his own unit in danger. Canorks were not immortal, he was going to help. He made a unit and headed for the front, to face the imported beasts.
When he got their, Fikar was trying to fend off the canorks. They seemed to fall for the trick of all the chaos, not noticing each other and instead noticing it was easier to kill people. Berlin saw that the canorks had no organization, he set out to reach the front gate.
When he reached the gate, he saw that it was like the back door, but now they had these beasts…One could most likely break open the door. He threw a rock at one, big enough to anger it. He dodged as it began the pounce, pushing in the door. It became curious, and walked inside. He hurried to get a scout, everyone needed to get into the castle.
The battle had shifted in doors, and here the people went for little hiding placed until the canorks became bored and either went on to discover or chose to be free. They now needed to seal off the exits, Berlin opened the back door and called in his unit, they were going to hold the inside.
Berlin met with Fikar while inside, “Fikar! Go to the higher floors, we’ll stay here in case of reinforcements!” Berlin bided Fikar to go, and so Fikar did, and it would be the last time Berlin saw Fikar.
Much later, as no reinforcements came, news came that Virk and Fikar were dead. Zixra was to be no longer a continent of poverty, Zixra was free. Berlin was joyed by this, it being his home. A new era had begun for Zixra…
Fikar hurried, wishing he had left with Berlin, he had already ordered that everyone run. He just kept running, his rune blade giving him the boost he needed and the gyro in it keeping it light. But his troops needed rest, and he could not give them it. He was torn, but he knew what he and they all had to do, they had to keep going.
By four and a quarter o’clock, they reached the end of the forest, towering over them from half a kilometer was the castle, the next run would bring many casualties. And injuries. Fikar had them charge, they would keep going until they reached the castle. Rocks came showering on them, sparklers and toxins. Some passed out, but nobody had time to carry anyone. People narrowly dodged showers of energy sparklers, burning at everyone. Many fell in the attack, still no one could stop for them. It was a chaotic rush, adrenalin made them run faster and by time they reached the castle they were keen to their surroundings.
A gate opened, and everyone braced to charge at tokuru foe, but instead a herd of canorks came out, growling from starvation. They were fighting each other, but then one looked at the mob of people, it ran forward and within a moment Joel Krela was no more then a mush inside the canork, everyone panicked. This caught the attention of all the other canorks and the chaos began, but Fikar refused to retreat. He pulled out his sword and began the battle. Others followed suit, charging instead of fleeing. Runes sacks were emptied and magick was used from afar. Archers were set up, aiming for mobs of canorks.
Fikar dodged death again and saw that Berlin was coming, heading for the front door. He headed that way, hacking away at the canorks that surrounded the area. By time he got there Berlin was gone, and the front door was wide open, the door bashed in. Fikar called his unit into Zovna, and the canorks followed the meal like a mouse would follow cheese, cautiously and only willing to move the least amount possible.
Inside people hided, waiting out the canorks and letting their hearts calm down. Soon the canorks left to be free, or moved deeper into Zovna. Everybody waited a few minutes before they got out of their little corners.
While fully seizing the first floor, Fikar met with Berlin who told him “Fikar! Go to the higher floors, we’ll stay here in case of reinforcements!” Fikar followed the instructions and took his unit up to the second floor.
There they had to fight humans, and after blocking the exits and clearing the floor they would have to move up to the higher floors. It seemed that the intercoms were not working. This went on until Fikar reached the sixteenth floor. There a stray canork lay, slashed at and bleeding, but it was in his side sight and by time he reacted, it was in a full leap. Everyone ran, a few went to attack it. It died, but before it did, Fikar was ripped at slain. He died within seconds, his body having given up. He let the life leave him, he was done fighting, he had done his job was sure that someone could help him, but he was ready to leave and he knew that he had to…
Kizox flew off with Nero and Kikaz, traveling at an extremely fast pace. He enjoyed it, it may be his last time flying. They could see in the distance the groups, running. Everybody in them were too tired to notice the air group flying over. He sent a thought at Kikaz ‘If there is any time in which we are waiting, I’ll play you game of chess.’
‘Sure’ was what he received, it held an evident tint of anxiety.
‘Don’t worry, you’ll be fine. You’ll be safe with Nero’ He made sure to coat it with calmness.
‘Your right. It’ll all go smoothly.’It was genuine, and Kizox closed the link.
Nero started to tilt, and he moved his wings to give a more horizontal angle. This made them accelerate forward and then quickly, land. The impact was gentle, 50,000 years of flight had made Nero an expert of it. He could decelerate quite smoothly. As soon as they landed Nero scanned the area, editing his mental map. He looked at the catapult balconies, they were closed.
A few hours later, the balconies opened and Nero flew up with the twins. He shot the balconies’ catapults and eventually all the catapults would be blown. Kizox had taken his cue though and hurried inside, his main target was the intercom room.
The paths were narrow, and most people traveling could be stopped easily as they hesitated before attacking Kizox, not knowing whether he was one of them. He traveled in stealth though, he wanted to get there unnoticed. He took a few turns, and when he thought he was lost he went straight until he found a land mark.
Eventually, in about half an hour, Kizox reached the intercom door. He clutched his dagger, pulled out the energy nullifier rune and ran in, holding it out he through shruikens across the room, that got him enough time to run over and slash everyone’s throat, and he succeeded.
He took it he was done, and headed out to go out and help Fikar. But by the sixteenth floor, only a few floors below him, he found Fikar’s unit leaderless. He found out what happened and took it upon him to lead this unit. They went up, clearing the floors and by the twenty-third the message that Virk was dead along with Fikar went through the building’s intercoms, and everyone was relieved, except the soldiers sandwiched in between Nero and Kizox…
Kikaz flew off with Nero and Kizox, traveling at an extremely fast pace. He would normally be worried flying, any slight wind could send them off. But he trusted Nero. But he was also worried about the battle ahead, they were greatly out numbered. They passed the other groups, running. Everybody in them were so tired that they didn’t notice Nero and the twins over head. Kikaz received a thought from Kizox ‘If there is any time in which we are waiting, I’ll play you game of chess.’
‘Sure’ was what Kikaz sent back, it held an evident tint of anxiety that he couldn’t hold back..
‘Don’t worry, you’ll be fine. You’ll be safe with Nero’ Kizox made sure to coat it with calmness.
‘Your right. It’ll all go smoothly.’It was genuine, and Kizox was satisfied enough to closed the link.
Nero started to tilt, and he moved his wings to give a more horizontal angle. This made them accelerate forward and then quickly, land. The impact was gentle, 50,000 years of flight had made Nero an expert of it. He could decelerate quite smoothly. As soon as they landed Nero scanned the area, editing his mental map. He looked at the catapult balconies, they were closed.
A few hours later, the balconies opened and Nero flew up with the twins. He shot the balconies’ catapults and eventually all the catapults were blown. Kizox had taken his cue though and hurried inside, his main target was the intercom room and Kikaz made sure that he would stayed in contact.
But Nero hurried, telling Kikaz “Follow me, I know where to go.” running through the halls with the know of the place as well as he knew anything, perfectly. His sword was fully out and whenever he passed someone, they were sliced at and died quickly and soundlessly. He hurried, and eventually reached the new warlord. The new warlord was a large man, a skullka, and had a bald head. He looked at the door which had just opened, and when he looked over Nero shot the fikos he was talking to, and then shot the skullka in the stomach, the skullka fell over and was quickly killed with another beam. He surely was an inferior replacement. Nero turned to Kikaz and said “Stay here, stop any enemies that come, use that dagger of that you got in Kizo.” And Nero went through the door. Only one person came in, a human, and Kikaz quickly slashed the poor person in the throat. From their he waited, playing chess with Kizox. Eventually Nero came back and heard the news of Fikar, with the information he took Kikaz and himself to the intercom room and announced that Virk and Fikar was dead…
Nero flew off with Kizox and Kikaz, traveling at an extremely fast pace. He enjoyed it, he always enjoyed flying. They could see in the distance the groups, running. Everybody in them were too tired to notice the group flying over the pedestrians. He slowed down, as he had caught up with the groups.
Nero started to tilt later, and he moved his wings to give a more horizontal angle. This made them accelerate forward and then quickly, land. The impact was gentle, 50,000 years of flight had made him an expert of it. He could decelerate quite smoothly and with ease. As soon as they landed he scanned the area, editing his mental map and checking for any enemies on the field. He looked at the catapult balconies, they were closed, he’d wait for them to open up for Berlin.
A few hours later, the balconies opened and Nero flew up with his pupils. He shot the balconies and eventually all the catapults were be destroyed. Kizox had taken his cue and hurried inside, his main target was the intercom room which Nero hoped he would reach it with stealth.
Once the catapult’s strings were all cut, Nero took Kikaz with him, he told him “Stay with me, I know where to go.”
He hurried, running with his sword in hand, slashing at any passing people and never looking back to see their dead carcasses. He went on through the corridors, turning at some and eventually he came to the door that lead to the warlord’s chamber. Nero opened the door, his mind already having charged energy.
And there stood the immense skullka, bald and talking with a fikos. He turned to look at Nero had some slight shock in his face and saw that Nero shot the fikos, who Nero knew held more threat being able to use magick. Then he was shot, he fell in awe and collapsed, but he was dead by time he hit the ground, as Nero shot him again with an immense beam of pure energy, burning his insides.
After, Nero turned to Kikaz and said “Stay here, stop any enemies that come, use that dagger of that you got in Kizo.” He was ready to face Virk.
Inside, Virk sat thinking of what Nero would do and not expect Virk to think he would do it. The door opened, and he charged in case. Nero walked in to a warm ray in front of his face. He absorbed it, turned to Virk and said “Virk my friend, what a rude way to welcome a guest! Of course, you never have thought of others much when you had more power.”
“You are no guest, now die fiend!” and with that another ray came blasting at Nero, and it was also charged.
“If I am no guest, and am a fiend, then I guess etiquette does not have play here.” Nero tossed Virk a ball of energy, letting his foe catch it, then Nero let loose, throwing orb after orb until he started feeling tired. Then he shot the chandelier, letting it fall onto the floor and shatter.
Virk was slightly shocked, but he was still ready enough to attack Nero, a beam of energy coated the floor, magnifying and shifting as it hit the jewels. Nero sent a shockwave to Virk, and that swept the sharp jewels in Virk’s direction. Virk ran for his exit, and started running up the stairs. Nero followed, shooting through the stone as he ran for Virk.
On the roof, Virk shot at Nero repetitively, not caring about the consequences. He shot a beam at Nero, who changed its direction and shot Virk, the energy of the two beings having combined, this shot Virk and Nero took it to his advantage to direct him on to the catapult placed there for the range in distance and angle. Virk was pressed there, exhausted. But he had a will to live and pulled Nero into the catapult, no longer having enough strength in energy. As Nero came flying with his katana in posture Virk pulled out some shruikens and threw them at Nero, Nero caught one and threw it at the catapult’s string, it flung Nero and Virk into the air. Nero shot at Virk, after Virk grabbed onto him. Nero swiped his claws at him, he let go in instinct, and Nero flew off.
As soon as Nero landed he headed for Kikaz who there told him Fikar had died. Nero took Kikaz to the intercom room then to announce the death of Virk and Fikar. The enemies inside them were demoralized, they knew they were doomed…
Virk sat at his desk, Yulz, his new warlord, would take care of Nero. He just had to survive. He waited, he had heard the catapults go off and received the alert. Yulz was going to have his first hard battle. Virk hoped he’d live up to his strength, but part of him already accepted that Yulz would never compare to Nero, and that today was the day that Zovna would fall, Yulz would die and unfortunately, he also would. He could not escape now, Nero was here and he had him surrounded. He could just wait in anxiety.
Much later, the door to his chamber opened and showed Nero. He shot at him, that fiend would not get an easy win with Virk. But Nero merely absorbed the ray and told him “Virk my friend, what a rude way to welcome a guest! Of course, you never have thought of others much when you had more power.”
This was enraging, coming in and waging war with him. Then asking to be treated like a guest, Virk must set him straight on this “You are no guest, now die fiend!” and shot him with another ray he absorbed.
The fiendish Nero just responded with “If I am no guest, and am a fiend, then I guess etiquette does not have play here.” now it was Virk’s turn to receive a firing upon, and many orbs came at him and were absorbed or reflected. Then that fiendish Nero shot at his lovely chandelier, having it come down and smash against the floor. He took advantage of this and let a wide energy beam through the sharp fragments, spraying across the room. Nero shot back with more force, enough that excess turned to kinetic and threw the shrapnel at Virk. He ran, through a door that he had for escape or usage of the roof’s catapult and hurried. Once he was on the roof, he charged a beam and blasted Nero with it as soon as the rascal opened the roof’s door. But he was shot back at again and this time it hit him full force, he was shot and directed into the catapult. But he was not ready to be done, he pulled Nero in with his last bit of energy and threw some shruikens he kept in his pocket at Nero, but the little devil caught one and flung the catapult. Virk was in the air with Nero, he would not let him get away, so he grabbed Nero. Nero wanted him to die, and he showed by giving Virk a gash in the arm. Virk let go in pain, falling away. In his last moments he thought to himself ‘This is all a game to him, he sees us all as his pawns. He has become so bored with life that in order to add spice he starts wars. He truly is a fiend. I should have stayed away from him. He is such an evil…’ But Virk was dead now, his carcass would soon land in some trees. Zovna was at the end of its life, Zixra would take over…
/w