Ur Begins to Stir...
We marched towards that fortress as quickly as we could, the thunder of hooves beating down under us. We made it in even shorter time, seeing the place in the distance by the time we rested for a good while. By the next time we rode we made it before we had to stop for another long period. There were indeed fourmites there, but they weren’t friendly in the slightest. I walked towards the fortress keep and the guards stopped me, saying I cannot enter unless “he” allows it.
We went to turn back when the guard went inside and came back out running saying he wished to see Toady, myself, Mastacheese and Tal. We entered slowly, guards ready to stab us at any point. A fourmite woman dressed in a rather revealing attire came out and showed us the way to “him”. After several flights of stairs, we were brought to a throne room. A figure sat on the throne away from us, and the shadow veiled his face and his upper body. Something was off on him but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
He stood up as his voice boomed. “Your greatest warrior must do battle with me, newcomers. I will fight them singlehandedly without any weapons.” I stepped forward; I was Guardian of Necrothreat for a reason, I will not fall to this fourmite today. He stepped forward, and then as I raised my blade, he moved quickly and kicked me in the side of the head before I could swing my blade. Next I felt several whacks hit me all over, but it felt as if he was using his upper arm, not his fists. Wait… No weapons? Not hitting me with his fists? I realized who this was when I took a kick to the chest and was knocked over.
I stood up and held my sword firm. “Its been awhile… Lieutenant BFEL… I see you haven’t lost your art of fighting without any hands.” I heard my allies and friends gasp as BFEL walked into the “light”. “So you do remember me. Excellent. Then you will remember me when I hand your ass to you.” He charged forward again and, since I remembered much of his tricks, I parried the attack and got a swift strike in on him. I heard him grunt as his body stiffened for a second. I then grabbed him and let the magic flow through my veins as I threw him up into the air and punched him as he fell back down. “Good hit…” he responded. “You seem to have gained a few tricks… As did I…” Suddenly he quickly ran back to his throne where he pulled a lever hidden next to the throne. He stepped forward and he became clad in what appeared to be a strange armor that was locked into his body. When the helmet clamped onto his head, his breathing was audible but stable.
“You see, I managed to create something on my journeys here. I managed to harness a great power by being one of the first of my kind… You see, I am of Necrothreader blood, but I’m not one of them. I know why you’re here Highmax, you wish to seek aid against Ur and try and save this land. I will join, on one condition: you best me in combat. My armor makes me use my power I hold without actually becoming a threadromancer.” His armor seemed to have mechanical gauntlets that glowed purple. They began to move as if his hands were inside of it. “Now come! Let us do battle!”
We ran towards eachother and before I could land a punch, he grabbed my arm and tried to throw me, but I swung my blade at him with my free hand, cutting into the armor and rending flesh. He let out a grunt of pain and then he let his “hands” open up and he glowed purple again, with the flows going into him. I heard the sounds of animals squealing, but I paid little heed to it. I tried to sever the magic in the armor but it was futile; I couldn’t stop it. Was this the first time technology bested magic? His armor repaired itself as his wound closed shut.
“The two best warriors in Necrothreat… Its fitting, is it not?” He began to laugh like a madman, as the purple aura drew back to his hands. He raised them towards me and a purple beam shot out to me. I quickly replied with a beam that shared the blue of my sword. We were evenly matched; one falter from either one and it was all over. Almost in sync, we ended our clash and charged back towards eachother again. His hands caught my blade before I could slash and he threw the blade away. I then threw another punch, flowing my magic into it to try and crush his armor. I landed my punch, but I ended up being blocked by his purple aura. Whatever that armor is, its damn near impenetrable. He then threw me across the room, and before I could get up, he was above me, grabbing me. I wouldn’t let him beat me! I HAD to win! I let out a great roar of fury as flames cloaked my body, but never burning me. Then lightning grew forth from my body and electrocuted BFEL in his armor. Lastly, I rended the stone floor and caused it to encase his arms and legs without breaking him. After I ended he just laughed. “Well… That was… Shocking!” He laughed heartily and madly, as if it was the funniest joke he ever heard.
I let him go and he told me how he got here. He said when Necrothreat fell, he found himself back outside the fortress’s walls. He felt inclined to get away, so he ran. But along the way, undead seemed to follow him. He killed them with ease, being a master of combat without hands, but they always stopped for a second as if they smelled or sensed something. He found out later they stop because they think he’s one of them, but he isn’t. He then traveled for days on foot, passing the tower and eventually making it here. He then found shards of armor everywhere, and then he let out a laugh, fell and terrible and used the corpses he found inside along with some pieces of metal to forge the armor. What he didn’t realize was it possessed vampiric magic, making him seem undead to all senses but sight. He said he went to the tower when there was still a threadromancer and began to torch the place without them noticing he wasn’t undead. He left and came back afterwards, but other fourmites followed him from the flames of the tower. They worshipped him as a god for killing the undead there, and they loved him. But he stayed here, for he knew they would return one day. Eventually fourmites grew drawn here, for some unknown reason. Even some who Mastacheese recognized were apparently in their midst.
When I asked how many were willing to fight, he said they all were… All two hundred of them. That brought us up to 300 fourmites, but it still wasn’t enough, even with BFEL’s armor. As we walked outside, we heard screams of panic, and we all went towards the gates to see a large squad of 50 undead. All appeared to be thread zombies armed to the teeth. The reindeer cavalry was inside the walls, but we couldn’t charge outside. I realized a small squad would have to fight them off. Toady, Myself, BFEL, Mastacheese and even Tal readied ourselves when Jenny opened the gates. They opened slowly, and the undead began to come. My blade began to glow a brighter blue, just like when I was first here, and I charged, the others following me. I took the first thread zombie down by splitting it from the skull in half. BFEL tore on apart with his armor hands. Mastacheese rode on his reindeer, distracting and killing as he trampled overtop the undead. Tal seemed to have gut one open before he ran off being chased by undead, claiming he “didn’t sign up for this”. Toady one fought valiantly and gracefully, crushing undead with ease.
The battle kept on until there were few zombies left. They then seemed to fall back, which was unheard of. I looked to the gates again and saw that a massive husk dragon was on his way here. BFEL seemed to grow nervous. “Its him… The Great Dragon of Ur has arrived. We gotta get everyone out of here before he takes wing!” I looked at my blade. I never fought a dragon before, and we had no time to get out of here. I ran ahead and BFEL shook his head, mumbling about it was nice knowing me and dragon chow. I kept on at a steady run, the dragon eyeing me as I came towards it. Perhaps this was my destiny; to fight a great dragon in the depths of Hell. It let out a roar and breathed fire at me. I conjured a magical shield and blocked the fire, advancing slowly, if not at all. When his flames ended, I was ten metres away and this dragon towered me. I have never seen anything so huge in my life; not even those titans and forgotten beasts were as big as this. He let out another roar as he swung his claw at me. I jumped on the claw and stabbed into its rotted flesh. Holding on for my life, the dragon brought his talon closed to his maw, where I then jumped into his opening mouth. It was dangerous being inside a dragon’s mouth, but after I began to cut everything in his mouth as I made my way towards his insides, it didn’t matter too much. I slid down its throat with my blade, black husk blood coating my entire body as I went deeper into his innards. Before I made it into his stomach, I spun my blade around, severing the stomach from the rest of his body. I landed inside of the now flooding stomach where I began to make my way towards his heart.
I don’t remember much after I began to climb up his ribcage to his heart. I was lucky his insides were hollow and empty instead of being filled with liquid. Black blood was filling up, but when I reached its heart, I stabbed it and climbed up to where it connected to the rest of his body. I severed the major arteries and I only saw black after then. I woke up afterwards with Jenny performing CPR on me probably breaking most of my ribcage in the process. I got up and saw everyone around me. “Wheres the dragon?” I asked, still woozy. “Dead. You actually killed it.” Toady One responded. “I hope the tales of dragon’s blood are true; you were soaked in it. They say that dragon blood, when bathed in it for a period of time like you were, they become nearly invulnerable, but that’s a story, and this is a husk, not a real dragon.” Jenny got up and wiped the blood off of her clothes. “Well, at least I didn’t have to give mouth to mouth… I wouldn’t stand for the taste of undead blood…” Mastacheese and Esther laughed a little bit as BFEL made a rude comment I couldn’t make out. “Well then, fearless leader, where to next?” Tal said mockingly. I looked towards the south and I grinned a little bit. “Well… There may be seafaring folk. Southward it is again.”