Bhaldannar Ironhide

Bhaldannar's first, and most difficult kill, was his mother. His sheer unnatural size won that battle.

The Gnolls that found the babe, hours from the womb choking on fluids, yet somehow clinging to life, wasted no time. The village shaman declared the babe a demon, and heir to great thrones of the savage races. He lived his childhood worshiped by the beasts. They nurtured him and prayed to him for strength. He grew. Gods how he grew.

At 12 years of age he crested 9 feet and over 600 pounds. Even for Trolls his size was baffling. His muscles encased him like twisted knots of ironcord. His arms, legs, and neck were long and agile. His eyes dark and knowing. When the village was attacked, he fought hard to save his Gnoll brothers. He almost won. His tribe was slaughtered. He was taken by the men of the dark army.

They toted him across the landscape in a cage of iron. When the bars broke, they bound him in thick ropes. When the ropes broke, they cut off his arms and legs and bound him in chains. They would grow back. When they arrived at their destination, Bhaldannar saw his first city.

The dark walls that surrounded the huge town hid the corrupt inhabitants from the rest of the world. Crime, sin, and extravagance ruled here. Slaves danced and toiled for rich masters. Sellswords protected mansions filled with art and illegal substances. And then there were the pits. The pits were loved by all.

Bhaldannar was given a sword and killed many. His raw savage power was unmatched by the other warrior slaves. He would fight two, three, ten men at a time. He would suffer wounds that nearly killed him, yet always arose the next day healed. Ready to fight again.

Four years passed before he cut his way free. Four years of constant battle, against man and monster. He fled the city, and was not chased.

The Brothers of the Laughing Moon were a feared and ruthless tribe or Orcs that ruled the wilderness beyond the city. They ambushed Bhaldannar. He slaughtered many. They swore to follow him, and so he lead. They ransacked small towns. They overturned caravans. They gained followers, and were soon an army. When their forces were strong enough, Bhaldannar bade them attack the dark city where he had been enslaved. It was the human's mages that turned the tides of battle. Their spells laid waste to Bhaldannar's forces. Again, he fled the city, his battle lost.

Alone and near broken, he made his way to the coast. With might and muster, he found passage on a ship to the new land. Magic had killed his army. He needed to find a way to battle this.

Two years in the green wild, he cut a swath across the landscape. He sought out challenges to best him, and many came close. Yet always he stood ready the next day to fight again. He traveled further north with each day, until he met a force of dark clad warriors. He knew their colors. There banners. He charged with a white hot rage. Again, he killed near all, yet was defeated by sheer numbers. A dozen warriors still stood to fight while Bhaldannar lay bleeding and broken. It was finally his time to die, it seemed.

A cold and rapid darkness filled the air as the warriors moved forward to finish the kill. Bhaldannar looked on in confusion and terror. A dark shape had manifested before him. It was as if time stood still. He craned his neck to look up into the cold dead eyes of this being. A twisted voice plundered his mind. He was told what he needed to do. He was told of the Black Robed Elf. His will was broken and remolded, and he swore to do his task. With that his wounds folded shut, and his weapon was back in hand. Slaughter ensued. And his new journey began. Onward North he ran, to find the Black Robed Elf, and serve his will with uncompromising loyalty.

Jhakkans- Rotten Luck

Jhakkans, in the simplest terms, was a rotten creature.

Mankind was a hobby for the nasty creature. Now Mankind were a fairly unsavory lot in of themselves. Greed, gluttony, and lust fueled most, if not all, of their daily actions. This made Jhakkans quite happy to witness. But even more so he enjoyed aggravating these evils.

Sometimes he would whisper evil thoughts into the ears of sleeping lordlings. Sometimes he would take valuables from the pockets of noblemen, and place them in the hands of commoners, simply to watch the men convicted of theft. Sometimes he would take the chastity of young maidens on their weddings eve. Jhakkans was a rotten creature.

Jhakkans moved around alot, staying in one town for no longer than a week. Raising as much hell as he could in that time, then simply moving on. As fate would have it, Jhakkans was passing through a very well off city out in the middle of nowhere when something strange happened. The town itself was fairly unusual, having its streets and skies swarming with draconian beings or the crimson persuasion, so Jhakkans had to be extra carefull not to be caught while playing his games here. It was going to be his last night in town, and he planned on making his last prank really count.

Thinking himself quite clever and subtle, he had managed to sneak into the private tower of this kingdoms monarch. Perhaps taking a rare magical item and hiding it in a servants chamber pot...Or maybe he would inscribe one of the tapestries with some lude images of human women submitting to pack animals. He buzzed around, unseen looking for the perfect victim of chaos, when all at once he was hit with a smell so strong he fell to the ground in mid flight. It was the unmistakable smell of pure uncompromised evil. He hadn't felt any so strong since his last visit to the lower circles of hell. Curiosity seized him.

Sniffing and huffing he shuffled along the walls in the form of a large spider, speedily tracking this trail of evil to its source. Up and up he followed it, to the apex of the tower. There at the top of the spiraling stair case was a broken door and two dead humans. The room beyond was dark and smoky. The stink of flesh rot and unrepentant sin poured out in waves. Jhakkans looked on in awe of this spectacle. What force could create such a wonderfully rotten stink of evil? Slowly and silently his eight tiny legs tip-toed across the stone to get a closer look.

As a minor being of the underword, Jhakkans had some natural instincts he was compelled to follow. The first of these was the need to cause mischief, but the second and strongest driving factor of his existence, was to find the most evil, sinister, diabolic creature around, and attach himself to it. To pledge himself to help it in its evil deeds. To serve its will and feed off the darkness it created in the world. It was simply what his kind did. He returned to his natural body out of respect, and onward he crept.

It was a darkness even his devil eyes couldn't cut through. Sniffing hungrily at the air, his lungs filled with the sweet smokey evil. It was like candy to his twisted soul. He pressed on into the mist greedily feeding. So great was his enjoyment of this wonderful murk, he stumbled and fell onto something. Something resting on the ground. It was a hand. Cold, bony, and lifeless. It was attached to a dark form laying on the floor he could barley make out through the shadows.

Angrily he gave the hand a kick. Another dead human. Peh!

Then it swiftly latched around his small neck in an iron grip, still cold as death. Jhakkans struggled and pulled trying to escape from his captor, but was simply hefted into the air as the fallen figure rose slowly to its feet. His tail lashed out, stinging the hand over and over, but his vile poison seemed to have no effect on this creature. His body fell limp in fear as his gaze was met by two dark green glowing eyes.

"Oh fraxaz! Look look look look at cheew! Great great evil we can smell it. Look at chew! heheheheh. Now now now now. Calm calm! Look look. Jhakkans come to YOU. Jhakkans follow your nasty nasty stinkum. Jhakkans is here to make friend! Jhakkans here to taste more of the evil! You is true evil, Jhakkins can see. Look look look. You is a glorious statue of darkness in this fluffly fraxaz world of pink gushy humans."

The figures grip grew tight as his eyes began to glow even brighter. Its other hand moved calmly and produced a black sword from...what looked like his own body. The blade shone just as evil as the creature who held it.

"Please no kill Jhakkans!! Please please please! Look look! Fraxaz!! Jh-Jh--Jhakkans wants to help his master! Busy busy world it is master! M'lord! Yes M'lord, busy busy world. Hard to make all the evil by yous self! M-M---Master--M'lord! Jhakkans wishes only to SERVE M'lord. Look look!!"

The darkness of the room was corrupt. The smell of the room was vicious. Everything about this setting was dark and ripe with evil, but it all failed in comparison to the wickedness of the laughter that filled the chamber. First quiet, then echoing with power. Like three voices at once. A horrible rotten laughter. Jhakkans began to giggle along with it, still fearing for his life. The face of his new master twisted into a pale and horrific smirk.

Lord Alkadian Entaris Beldier III- Final Moments

All the pieces had finally fit into place.

The thought that from the moment they has set foot off the ship onto this untamed wild land an unseen hand had been guiding his every step was hard to imagine, yet here he was. Every major even of the past half year had lead up to this moment. The arrival of the mysterious Varkus Grey. Alkadians death at the hands of the air elemental. The underground passages leading them right where they needed to go. Even the destruction of his beloved Rog Bael. And now the meeting with the powerful King Wanden.

It was all according to plan. His plan.

**********

It wasn't until the third night staying in Wanden's kingdom, after their return from the fallen temple, that he was awoken by the whispers. A flood of chanting viral whispers drifting on the air around his bed. He looked around in confusion and anger, but the voices tickled his mind with the promise of secrets. Secrets he had been seeking since he was just a boy.

Rising from his bed he paced across the cool stone floor to the table that held his belongings. His Grey Elven eyes pierced through the darkness, seeking out the source of the whispers. It wasn't the same voice as before. It was not the dark lord calling to him. This was a new voice. As he desperately rifled through his belongings the voices grew louder. The secrets seemed almost at hand now. When his fingers made contact with the hard wooden surface, he felt instantly as though a bridge had been formed between his own mind and a pool of dark secrets long forgotten to both time and reality. This object had seen the world born, and then die, only to rise again. It held legends and dark truths no man was meant to know. The answer was there in front of him. The words he had been seeking for over 200 years....

He spent the rest of the night scribbling down runes and incantations frantically. His fingers bled. His parchment became depleted, so he wrote on walls, shelves, and the table, all the while laughing an empty laugh.

************

The next day King Wanden came to his room. He was very brief and very serious. He simply informed Alkadian that a room had been prepared for him in his private tower. It was well supplied and would be guarded at all times. It seems a higher power had insisted, and some people you just can't say no to. Another piece of the puzzle fit into place.

************

The process would take over a month. That much time was very valuable to someone of his lifestyle, but then again, time was really no issue to their new ally.

Just as he had been promised the room was stacked to the ceiling with old books, vials or rare components, spools of enchanted thread, and tools of the finest mithril. There was no time to waste. Alkadian closed the door without hesitation, knowing full well what trials lay before him. More pain than he had ever experienced. His mind would be cooked and stretched as far as his intellect could wane. Simply put, it would kill him. He locked the door and set to work without a second thought.

*************

On the final day of the ritual the room had become a dark and horrible place. The candles had burned out weeks ago. Alkadian had not slept. Not eaten. Not so much as rested his eyes. The smell of blood and death hung heavy in the air, like a tepid stew of decay billowing in and out of his panting lungs. His hands moved with care and focus, as they always had.

Over hand, Under hand, Loop, Knot.....


He whispered dryly over cracked lips. The smooth fabric felt so soft and warm in his hand. It was etched deep with runes he had kept safe with him since his days at the Academy of the Silver Tome. These kinds of items required the words that spoke of both life and death to be written and imbued with them. To ensure he never lost them Alkadian had scarred them into the canvas of his body, every morning for his centuries of life. Now they rested before him, slowly folding and wrapping around like wide ribbons. Ribbon made of his own skin. Attaching them to the blade was surprisingly harder than removing them from himself. A piece of the puzzle.

The blade he had carried with him through it all. A long elegant curved blade. Light in its elven design, and wickedly sharp. It was adorned with the symbols of his house, Beldier. The once cutting edge now wrested inside the hardening folds of living flesh. The thread that had once been used to hold together his powerful guardian Rog Bael now infused the item with a terrible stamina. Another piece of the puzzle.

He painted over the scrolls of skin with a dark red substance. The blood of an ancient dragon, supplied by the generous King. It filled the cracks and brought the runes to life. He chanted the words. He spelled out the secrets he had learned in an ancient language that had fallen from no living tongue in ages. He drew a map with his mind. The map of the trails drifting between worlds. He remembered them clearly from when he died. The rivers that connect the world of the living to the land of the dead. All the pieces falling swiftly and terribly into place.

He sang the wretched song. He chanted to the Gods of undeath. His voice was like that of a host of spirits. Each sang in an octave more terrible than the last, and together formed the harmony of immortality. He wove his pale bony hands over the glowing blade like a conductor leading a grand symphony. The blade, now wrapped in a hard shell of living canvas seemed to quiver. Like a worm tearing free of a cocoon the encasement peeled away and melted to a hot black viscous fluid. The runes still blazed brightly around the blade, as if floating on an invisible shell blanketing the now black metal. He was almost done.

There was no strength left in him. He slumped forward in agony, his body finally giving in to the tortures he had self inflicted these past weeks. All at once the ritual came crashing down around him. His eyes went wide and he whimpered in agony and defeat. All his trials..All his work. Gone....


No.

There was still one way to finish it. The last piece of the puzzle.

Drawing forth every last ounce of power he still held in his limbs he staggered to his feet. Calling on all the strength he had put into every step of his long journey he snatched up the blade. The power was quickly draining from it. It's pulsing glow had become a faint hum.

Alkadian shouted out curses against his father. He shouted curses against his friends. He called out curses against every foe he had encountered and those he was yet to meet. His words were iron in the air. His tongue cut through all that was once decent and pure, and the room shook under the force of his rage. The door, triple bolted and barred blasted off its hinges. The books and vials burst and exploded into torrid pillars of green flame. The guards looked in terror, and when their honest mortal ears became subject to the chain of arcane atrocitys Alkadian was weaving they simply fell dead, their souls ejected from their bodies.

With a cacophonous roar against the very world in which he lived, Alkadian lifted the blade high over his head. The stone walls shook and began to crumble around him. If felt as though the whole tower would topple under the force of his blasphemes towards all that was good, so mighty was his conviction. And when at last there was no more strength in his lungs to support his words the flames and tremors all snuffed out at once. With the swiftness of a striking serpent, Alkadian plunged his blade, his Phylactery, deep into his heart. Then he died.

Western Rides and Dragon Hides. A poem by Lord Alkadian Entaris Beldier III

Through tunnels black as raven's backs
And Castles tall as Skies
The time and place
A stalwart pace
On trails of watchful eyes

Through night and day and night again
On foot and steed and stone
The sun and air
No flames compare
To freedom's novel tome

Ahead beyond the hills of green
To ruins though they ride
With blade and spell
And arrows fell
They cut their brave swath wide

Some friends had fallen on the road
And others turned aside
Yet smell of gold
An tales not told
Gave worth to trials vied

Another day, another Quest
Another legend wrought
No foe had seen
A fate so keen
The way the heroes fought

The human tied in hues of brown
The forest's brave marquis
Who's flights fell faultless from the sky
Like apples from a tree

The swordsman from another world
Who dances on the wind
A blade of steel
A heart of zeal
And mercy wearing thin

An Elven Lord from foreign lands
Who wears a drape of night
He summons fire
He speaks with Ire
His heart is full of blight

The halfling with the killing blade
A shadow in the light
Be quite aware
He's never there
In reason, or in sight

Their names are known
Their deeds are told
Their infamy abounds

So fear new world
And do not sleep
They wander on your grounds.

**********

Alkadian looked ahead to his riding companions to be sure no one saw him writing. Wiping the quill off on his saddle wrap, he quickly tucked away his scribes tools. He neatly rolled the parchment into a tight tube and dropped it into the wind. It drifted away care free as it crumbled into ashes on the air. Poetry was such a silly waste of his brilliant mind, but a sight more entertaining than this dreadful landscape.

Alkadian Entaris Beldier III- Change of Plans

He had made an oath that he would show no mercy in his quest to seize his share of land and power in the endless green wilds of this norther world. He had tightened his robes belt and flung charges from his wands without thinking twice. He had sworn to take his power to the next level and bring fear to all in this world. Then he had died.

Killed by a monster made of the very wind. His spells had blasted through it, but even his strongest enchanted defenses were no match for its relentless pummeling at the speed of gale wind. His body was crushed. Ruined. Ended.


He awoke angry, to say the least.

For over a century Alkadian had pondered the mysteries of the afterlife, but what he saw upon opening his eyes was far from anything he could have expected. There was no distance. There was no up or down. There was simply forever. He saw further than the boundaries of the mortal realm, through the mirror pools floating in the air around him. Each reflection a tapestry to the birth and death of a world. Every breath of air was like a cold smoke that seized his insides in a vice. Suddenly aware of the infinite dimensions of death, Alkadian fainted.

He woke again, in a new place. Still the mirrors. Still the endless darkness and confusion. But this time the mirrors were reflections of his very person. Every deed he had ever executed was playing before him. Every torture, every act of arcane destruction, and every moment of fear and sadness. He would have fainted again but a cold hand gripped his shoulder.

This is not death child of the Beldier.

He turned to face the speaker. Before him stood a towering mass of shadows and flesh. The very borders of his silhouette seemed to blur and vanish from his mind instantly. All he could make out was two dark green glowing eyes, and the cold skeletal hand that held him in consciousness.

"I know you... By the Gods I couldn't say how...But I know you." Alkadian stammered, not sure what he was seeing, or even saying.

I have been with you for a great time now Beldier. You do not know it, but long have you tread in my footsteps. Much of your life you have sought secrets. Dark and terrible writings frowned on by the churches of man. The very utterance of such words has brought death to many and the hands of the righteous. I am the keeper of these secrets young child. I am the Shepperd who can lead you to the realm of undeath. I know of the power you seek, and through me you would have it, and great and terrible would it be.

"I.. I don't understand. Loviatar...The Goddess of Pain... I gave her my prayers. I was promised a life at her side, in the pits of eternal torment. I was to have power in death as her aid."

Your false Goddess had turned on you fool. She was simply a dream. A hope. My power is real!

To emphasize this point the figure channeled a wave of burning magic through Alkadians body. Mirrors cracked, and he cried out in confusion and agony.

I am the Power you seek. You are not to wait till your death to reach your potential child. I will grant it to you in life. In unlife. Neither shall you live or die, but power you WILL have. Follow me, and do my bidding young one. Take my hand and let me show you the secrets you deserve.

Alkadian was now on his knees as the pain stopped surging through him. His mind flashed back to his days at the academy. The reading he had stumbled upon. The runes he had inscribed into his very flesh. The promise he made to himself. His reaction surprised even the great spirit of death at his side.

He lifted his head in a twisted smile. As he rose to his feet he began to laugh. Not a weak and terrified laugh, but a laugh at the realization of what laid before him. His laughter echoed through the eternity around them and the mirrors began to fade away. The robes he wore began to swim with shadows, and the midnight blue of House Beldier melted away to a shade of impossible black.

"My Master. Yes my Master. Teach me Father. Show me to the power... I will become unstoppable, and in your name I will rule with fear."

The great hands of skeletal darkness embraced him and their laughter became one. His body was pulled into the blurring form of the Lord of Undeath, and everything was dark and beautiful.


Alkadian awoke with the taste of blood in his mouth, and overpowered by a smell he would never forget. The stink of Dragons.

Death and failure.

Dead. When Alkadian had fallen, Drevlin thought for sure it was something he could fix, not a mortal wound that had carried his charge so far down through the river. But as Drevlin searched for his spirit, the whispers came screaming out of the void, telling of a passing beyond the final gate. He knew then for sure that the evil mage was gone, his spirit taken like a piece of floatsam, swept away by the current of a swollen, raging river.

The screams subsided back to the almost inaudible hiss that always danced just outside of comprehension. But they were speaking. Speaking about his failure. About his weakness. Drevlin wondered for a moment, there on the edge of the cliffs surrounding the castle that had been Alkadian's doom. He wondered what to do next. For the first time in an age, he felt lost. Without a direction or purpose. But all he could think about was how he had failed his master. And then, in a fearful realisation, he wondered what his master would do to him as punishment for his shortcomings. Velsharoon was not know to him to have a shred of mercy in his being. Quite the opposite. He would not have to wonder long.

"JUMP!!!" The whispers were screaming again. "JUMP! Fall to your doom. You have failed. Velsharoon commands and you shall obey." For just a moment, Drevlin thought of ignoring the whispers demands. He, of course, knew that it would be futile. It would be but a small thing for Velsharoon to claim his soul. He knew he had no choice. Without so much as a look back to his companions, as they were of no import without Alkadian, Drevlin threw himself off the path and into the void. He could see the rocks below rushing up at him and then he hit with a wet smack.
At least Drevlin thought he did. He definitely hit something. Hard.

Drevlin lay in the dark of the abyss. Not breathing. Not feeling. Not moving. Then he jumped out of his skin in fear. "Drevlin! Rise and come hither." Drevlin knew that voice all to well from his nightly rituals. It belonged to his master. Velsharoon was calling his name. Drevlin tried to open his eyes, but he saw only darkness. True darkness, for even his dwarven eyes could not pierce it. He turned his head, looking for anything that he might see. Something was coming to him, a snaking tendril of green light was slithering across what must have been the floor. It stopped on the ground near him and Drevlin realised it was nothing more than a guiding light for him to follow. He stood in abject terror. Drevlin knew where he was. He knew where the light went as well. He was in the astral crypt of his god, and he was doomed. Drevlin began to float along the lighted path through the darkness, seeing neither wall or floor, as if the small glowing tendril was the only thing that existed besides himself. He knew all to well that this was not so.

Drevlin followed the light for what seemed to be forever. He realised that the whispers had returned, quietly murmuring about things in a language he did not understand, words that made his head swim with dizziness. They were getting louder as he went along the path, and he thought he could see light up ahead. The flickering light of a fire or torches. Eventually he came to the edge of the darkness, and Drevlin peered into a cavernous room lit in the center by a huge fire, although the fire itself looked strange. There were pillars with torches ensconced along them all through the huge antichamber, row after row of them. Drevlin couldn't even begin to imagine the size of this place, until he realised that the wall that ran along his left was actually a huge mirror, and was reflecting the pillars and torches. He imagined that somewhere to his right, if were to look close enough, there would be another mirror wall, reflecting the the other mirror's image to infinity.

"Come in, my faithful servant. Your journey has been long and fraught with hardships. Something or someone very powerful has been working against me, against us. You have done well. Now put away your fear and come to my side." Drevlin thought the voice was coming from by the fire, which was sunken down in a small amphitheater. This was strange to him for two reasons. The first was that Drevlin could see no one by the fire. The second was that for the first time in his life, the voice of his lich-god and the whispers as well, were coming from somewhere other than inside of his head.

Drevlin approached the fire cautiously and circled the small amphitheater. Seeing nothing, Drevlin turned his attention to the huge blaze. Strangely, he felt colder the closer he got to it. And then something else made him feel even colder. He was looking at the flames and realised that it was not fire at all, but writhing souls trapped inside a circle of... blood and salt it looked to be. A powerful binding, to be sure as even a master necromancer would have to work very hard to trap even one soul like this. And the price to be paid for such was unthinkable. But here within the circle, Drevlin thought there must be hundreds or even thousands of souls, all writhing and twisting within the circle. And they were whispering incoherantly. Drevlin swore he could see faces in that writhing mass, coming to the surface, only to be drug back down into oblivion. All of them looked to be frozen in a scream.

Drevlin felt a hand upon his shoulder, and he snapped around, startled once again. He screamed aloud then, for what he saw was horrifying. Red glowing eyes, full of evil and hate, floating in a skeletal visage. Drevlin was staring into the eyes of death itself. And death was staring back. Drevlin had finally met his master, Velsharoon.

Alkadian Entaris Beldier III: Quelling the Fires

Her feet pounded the stone like a charging elephant, knocking over tables and slamming through doorways in the retreat. She knew the twists and turns of her beloved castle like the back of her hand, yet she could not loose him. She threw chairs and toppled book cases to block his path, yet her aggressor did not cease his pursuit. The giantess ran for her life from the robed man, clutching her wounds tightly. Yet she could not escape.

She spun around one last corner and fell to her knees from exhaustion and blood loss. She knew he was close on her tail, and she could already smell the smoke from the fires he had created. Another explosion of magical force heated the air and laid waste to a nearby room. She began to cry. Her husband was killed, her home now on the brink of utter destruction, and even fighting as valiantly as she could against the terrible little creatures, she was now taking her last breaths. There were near eight in the cave where her husbands corpse now rotted, yet only one had given her chase back here to the castle they called home. Why wont he just leave...I have surrendered!

Wiping tears and blood from her face her vision cleared, and then she saw him. He stood leering at her, face streaked with burning rage. His robes billowed at the force of dark magic pouring off his body. His skin glistened like polished stone. The wand in his hand was still smoking from its last discharge, and his eyes...hollow pools of relentless anger. Slowly he raised his wand.

She cautiously rose to her feet. She hadn't remembered dropping her morningstar, but she had never been this scared before either. The little elf man barely came up to her knee, yet she was backing away, trembling. Why was he after her? Why had he chased her into her own home? He suddenly spoke, perfectly inflecting the tongue of giants.

"You monsterous bloody stupid cow! Do you have even one inkling what kind of a grievous blasphemy your careless hands have wrought??"

His words seemed to shake the very foundation of the stronghold.

"You've killed him! You have brought an end to my MASTERPIECE!" He emphasised his anger by hurling a volley of white energy bolts into her chest. It didn't kill her, but he seemed to know it wouldn't.

"You won't even have the blessing of torture at my hand you fat sobbing bitch. My Goddess will not receive your song of pain. No, you will die in agonizing terror, knowing you and your bumbling tree-brained husband meddled in the affairs of Lord Belider, and paid the price!"

She saw him clutch his empty hand to a fist, and immediately she felt as though her brain was in a vice. The world seemed to be crushing in around her. There was no way of knowing this kind of pain and fear was possible. As she looked upon him in pleading agony his form began to shift. Thousands of black shadowy spider legs seemed to blossom from his aura, filling the hallway like a living web. He body and head began to melt into shadow, forming a huge eyeless gaping maw of fangs and acid. She felt as though it was pulling her in by the soul, and her body was being dragged along with it. It was like a nightmare. This couldn't be real. Those were her last intact thoughts as her body was fed into the spinning ripping mouth of terror, rended into a thousand screaming shreds.

Alkadian looked down on her corpse. Her lifeless face was twisted into a horrific silent scream, and her body was contorted as a trophy to the pain of her final moments. She had taken very willingly to the illusion. Her mind had been weak, and the fear had literally killed her in an unquestionably dreadful manner. She deserved it, and so much more.

He felt a pit of emptiness in the back of his mind. A piece of him had died. This cowering thick headed Cloud Giant had utterly crushed his beloved creation. She had broken him beyond any chance of repair. Her cursed over sided excuse for a weapon ripped apart his tedious stitching and smashed his brilliantly grafted limbs. All the energy and time Alkadian had put into the creature were all torn away in an instant. Rage had instantly stolen his mercy and rational. Every ounce of his energy had gone into swift retribution. He couldn't say that he felt any better, but whats done is done. The others coudln't understand.

It was then and there, pacing back through the giant sized structure, that Alkadian came to a new understanding. This untamed land wasn't going to be simple to overtake. It wasn't going to acknowledge his greatness and kneel to him. It was going to throw everything it had at him and his allies, and leave them broken and bruised every time. He was done holding back. He was done standing behind as his allies lashed out with arrows and swords. True, he no longer had Rog'Beal to protect him, but he also had no further reason to simply help with small displays of force. No. He was done with subtlety. If this unforgiving terrain was going to get in his way, he would tear it to nothingness with pure arcane fury.

He sat down on a fallen piece of furniture to gather his thoughts and try to quell his rising anger. Another thought to Rog'Bael's fallen frame made the rage come flooding back, and like a reflex his arm extended and the wand spewed out another consuming ball of fire which destroyed half the contents of the room. Breathing slowly he calmed himself. The smell of smoke and magic was thick around him, but he needed to ignore it to focus. Just then a thought came too him. Cloud Giants are no simple poppers when it comes to acquisitions. Perhaps.... With that he sent out a wave of energy seeking any items of enchantment and value within the structure. The wave returned to him bringing the promises of magic hidden nearby. He lifted one eyebrow in interest as he rose to his feet.

A pounding at the door came.

"Alkadian! Are you in there? We heard explosions!"

"......Of course." He grumbled.