Christopher Kellen - Elegy

There was still corruption flowing in the manna here, but he could feel that its influence had faded. The demon that lived here in Calessa had obviously been counting on its lupine minion to take control of this area and its power, but instead the wolf had lingered in its lair, merely taking what it needed in order to survive and build its power. It was a fatal mistake that he could not afford to repeat; once he had built up his power here just enough, he would need to make his next move quickly in order to catch the enemy as unaware as possible.

Once more he plunged his hands into the pool of light, and stiffened. The power surging through him, combined with his exhaustion, was almost more than he could bear. He had used a lot of energy defeating the fel wolf, and now purifying the font was nearly too much for him. He felt the pull of the manna tug at his soul, at his flesh, persuading him to join it and give up his life to become one with the earth. He fought against that urge, resisted its siren call. Instead he flooded the font with what pure energy remained from his trance, pouring all of it into the river in the hopes that what he carried within him would be enough to cleanse the font fully, so that he might then immediately begin drawing power from it to sustain himself.

It was agony; the tug on his soul became nearly too much to resist. He cried out in pain, in ecstasy, they blended together and his mind began to meld with the earth and become one with the flow and he could feel the power shining out of his eyes…

The heavy thunk behind him of the door opening snapped him back to consciousness. He heard the squealing of the hinges behind him, and he turned around to face whatever new threat had come to him, now interrupting this most crucial work. He drew his sword off his back…

He came face-to-face with the wide-eyed stare of the young soldier.

"Master Arbiter, I…" the boy stiffened immediately. The power was still radiating from D'Arden, so strong he thought it must be shining through his very flesh. Mikel cried out in pain and collapsed to the ground as the energy washed over him. He began screaming, sobbing as the light from the manna began to twist his flesh.

"Why?" D'Arden asked, his voice echoing like thunder.

"I…" the boy screamed again as he tried to speak, and D'Arden could see the flesh beginning to melt from his face. "I came to warn you! Some… something is coming!"

"YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED AWAY!" D'Arden roared, awash in anguish and rage and confusion and loss, for he knew already that the boy was doomed.

With no choice but to leave the boy to his hideous fate, D'Arden turned back to the pool of manna, plunging his hands deep within it again even as he dropped his sword to the floor. The shrieks of the boy faded rapidly to piteous wailing, and then merely to moans as the manna forcefully drew out his soul and transformed his flesh, likely into something truly hideous. Exposure to the light of the manna would reveal the worst in a normal man, destroy the facade of normal humanity and bring forth the truth from them in the most painful manner possible.

As the flow of manna within the font shifted from corruption to purity, D'Arden felt the energy immediately flow into him. He felt rejuvenated, his mind snapped back to full alertness. Now that the balance of power within the font had tipped in his direction, he could draw his power from it. He felt elated, the joy surging through him as surely as the power itself did.

He withdrew his hands at last when he felt as though he was brimming with so much of the manna energy that he felt radiant and nearly invincible. It was only then that he remembered the plight of the poor soul, laying on the ground behind him, completely destroyed by the energy that sustained him.

D'Arden turned, expecting to see some horrifying vision lying on the ground just outside the door of the font chapel. He had seen many men in his time that had been struck by the light of the manna font, most of whom had turned into something resembling a creature out of a child's nightmare or campfire ghost story. They usually ended up with their limbs twisted about, looking as though they had broken themselves several times in an attempt to get away from the horrid things that were happening to them.

Despite his desperate hope, there was no solace to be found here.

The boy’s innocent form had become twisted into a frightening monstrosity, its flesh blackened and withered. As he watched, it scrabbled to its feet, sporting long claws that had sprouted unceremoniously from its hands. Only a few strands of wiry hair remained of the boy’s shock of brown, and those strands stood out straight from the creature’s head. The boy’s clothes had sloughed off the creature’s greatly reduced mass, and the beast stood naked before him, though nothing remained that would define it as indecent. It entirely ignored the soldier’s blade on the ground between them, and instead it stared at him with yellow eyes that burned with hunger. Mikel had not been exposed to the light of the manna font long enough to die, it seemed… but only long enough to awaken.

The fel beast let out a shriek, a cry of both pain and hunger.

It lowered its head and rushed at him.

Sorrowfully, D’Arden simply stepped aside. The boy’s lack of experience in the matter of fighting even showed through to this hungry monster that he’d become. In a single motion, D’Arden drew the crystalline blade from the scabbard on his back and cleaved downward, splitting the beast in twain at the waist.

The creature that was once Mikel tumbled to the ground in two halves, each one quickly dissolved by the blue purifying flames.

D’Arden stood in the silent streets for a moment, his head bowed.

Then, in his ears rang the boy's warning, as clear as though he'd said it that same moment. Something is coming.

He slid the manna blade back into its sheath and stepped outside the chapel, slamming the door closed behind him. He looked to the left and to the right, but he could neither see nor hear anything approaching. What had the boy seen or heard, then, that had bothered him enough to make him enter the chapel?

The sun had set over the horizon only a few minutes before, and darkness was beginning to settle in. As he stood there in the cold with a breeze blowing across him, he heard a scuttling sound, and then a chattering in some language that he could not decipher, though it sounded ancient and stilted like a philosopher's tongue.

The sound was rapidly retreating in the direction from which he and Mikel had come a few minutes before. He stared in that direction, knowing that less than a mile away stood the gate to the Old City.

That, then, was his next destination. Whatever it was that was scrabbling across the cobblestones was unmistakably heading in that direction, and though it could potentially be a distraction – some minion sent by the demon to lead him down the wrong path and away from his lair – it could also be something important, exactly the direction that he needed to be going.

He had no other leads, and his only guide to the city was dead. The font here was purified, and he knew that if he waited too long, the demon's forces would come to reclaim it.

D’Arden looked toward the font chapel where Mikel had fallen, refusing to lay eyes on where the fel beast that had replaced him had died. He had seen too many things like this in his short lifetime, too many innocent lives stolen away by the power he served, and the corruption against which he fought. His dark hair streamed outward in a soft breeze that passed, and his black cloak flared outward, casting a dark shadow across the door of the chapel.

Wasted life was an incredible shame.

Shaking his head slowly, the Arbiter set off down the street.