The Scroll of Exalted Ponies

Steadying himself, Sullen Hoof began floating lumps of ashen dirt up to himself, spreading it out over him. In no time at all had the scared pony completely covered himself and his fine silken chef garbs in dirt. Sullen Hoof also directed Speaker to finder a way to let the circle walk on the withering grounds, Speaker testing a number of readily available materials before settling on using his singing staff to summon up stones in the swamp to reshape them into horse-shoes – for the stone could not wither, since it was not alive.

Outfitted with stone shoes and camouflaged using the ashen dirt, Sullen Hoof peeked over the crest of the hill. This time there was no dark essence lightning, allowing Sullen Hoof to survey the landscape beyond.

What Sullen Hoof described sounded very weird to Speaker. The shadowland seemed to be centered on a large three-tiered ziggurat that had a huge purple crystal hovering above it.

While Sullen Hoof scouted ahead, slowly moving down the hill, Speaker outfitted the rest of the circle with stone shoes – except for Cash who had his magic shoes, and Sunrise and himself who seemed to be able to resist the withering touch of the land by force their essence alone.

Red wasn’t particularly keen on the stone shoes: “They’re brittle! They’ll break if I buck or punch anything”

“Then we’ll have to get to safe ground before we start fighting anything. The ground around the ziggurat is covered in stone tiles – that might be safe to walk on without protection” Sullen Hoof said, having returned to the circle without being noticed.

Startled by Sullen Hoof’s sudden reappearance Red gave a start, but quickly regained her composure while giving the decidedly dirty Sullen Hoof a mean glare. Sullen Hoof just smirked under his equally dirty hat.

Sullen Hoof had spotted some trees a bit further into the shadowland – strange dead trees of iridescent white wood. He figured that they would give sufficient cover to sneak up on the ziggurat. Shimmer had a slightly different idea…

Having shifted into her monsterpony form in full combat ‘regalia’ – the scale feathers, the insect-like chitinous armor growths – Shimmer wanted to walk through the dark lighting straight to the ziggurat.

Sullen Hoof wasn’t much for this very much not subtle approach, but Red supported the idea of a full on assault: “It’s faster, come on!”

Moments later the circle strode confidently down the ashen hill towards the ziggurat. The dark lightning intermittently pulsed from the giant dark purple crystal hovering above the manse. It had dark cloudy shapes writhing inside it –and Speaker didn’t like the look of it one bit: This a mockery of what a true manse was meant to be!

The lightning itself hit Shimmer over and over, this time as an unending stream of death, but with her powerful shapeshifted armor it barely even left scorch marks. Behind her the rest of the circle took cover as the lightning scattered and broke on her seemingly impenetrable bony body-armor.

From what Speaker could see when peeking out behind Shimmer then the fortress they were approaching was of a very old design… in fact, it reminded him specifically of certain early first age strongholds: The ziggurat was a giant three-tiered stepped pyramid, with a wide ground level with at least ten yards to the roof of the first level. On top of that was another level, equally tall, with walls as vertical as the ground level’s, but only took up a small amount of the roof of the ground level.

On top of that was an even smaller level, just as tall, and above that… a giant purple crystal around which dark lightning twisted and crackled. It was clearly some kind of manse, but Speaker had seen the maps of the area: There weren’t any known demesnes in the area – let alone any strong enough to power kind of manse defenses – heck, even the strange forest of iridescent white trees was a new feature, and forests don’t just appear out of nowhere… at least not outside of wyld-zones.

As the circle got close enough to step up on the rough cobble-stone that covered the ground around the manse the circle made a grim discovery:

“Oh gods…” Sullen Hoof suddenly said, catching his breath. While the rest of the circle had been looking up at the death-ray they were now in cover of, Sullen Hoof had been looking down… and he had noticed a very grim feature of the cobble they now stood on: “It’s tomb-stones! I think we’re standing on graves!”

The rest of the circle quickly looked down. It was true – hundreds, if not thousands of gravestones, some simple, some beautifully detailed, lined the ground around the manse. Sunrise was quick to point out why this was a really bad thing, her ears twisting about under her wide hood: “I can hear ghosts nearby”

Speaker quickly facehoofed at his own folly: He should have known better than to not walk into a shadowland without his spirit detection charm on. Willing the occult patterns of essence into existence within his ears, eyes and hooves Speaker instantly caught on to the quiet groans and rattle of strange ethereal voices… but they were coming from above the circle?
“They’re above us. I think the ghosts patrol the first roof level – not down here” Speaker said with a whisper.

Shimmer reached up towards the roof of the ground level with a taloned forelimb – it stretched unnaturally all the way ten yards up to the edge… but suddenly a skeletal pony leg and hoof poked out of the stone wall and tried to grab the extended leg.

Quickly retracting her limb, Shimmer peered intently at the limb with her third eye: “Speaker, the walls… this isn’t rock…”

Putting a stone-shod hoof up against the manse wall Speaker began to nod. The sound of his shoe against the wall was not one of stone against stone… instead the ashen surface crumbled ever so slightly, for on the surface it was as dry and nearly as hard as stone, but it certainly wasn’t stone: It was dry and tough ashen flesh interspersed with plates of rune-carved bone. This whole manse… it wasn’t alive, but it certainly wasn’t entirely dead either: “This place is an abomination”

“All the more reason to destroy it” Shimmer said as she zipped up to the first floor roof, being pulled up by her extended arm after again snaking it up, this time taking care to dodge any blood-soaked skeletal limbs that would poke out of the wall to grab her.

Peeking over the edge to the Roof level Shimmer suddenly pulled herself up on the roof with a fierce warcry, the rest of the circle only getting to see her disappear over the edge, followed by the sounds of fighting.

The ponies down on the ground scrambled to find a way to get up to Shimmer. Cash aimed a hoof up at the edge and tried to fire a claw to pull himself up – but he missed. Red sighed and aimed for him, the claw this time embedding itself deep into the ash-covered flesh wall. Cash was able to pull himself and Red up.

Speaker gestured for Sunrise to over to him while he retrieved Gift from his saddlebags. Attaching Gift to his right fore-hoof, Speaker gazed intently at the disk as it spun up with a humming buzz and a puff of steam. It then slowed down the circulation of the blades, and rearranged them so that they cut in a serrated pattern. Around each of the blades an extra large cutting edge of pure glowing essence extended…

Grabbing Sunrise with his left hoof, Speaker thrust Gift forcefully into the ashen flesh. The ashen flesh wall was dry and tough, which suited Speaker perfectly, as the bladed disk spun up and dug in. The essence-based blade extensions quickly faded, but they did their job: With the momentary addition to cutting power Gift managed to embed itself several inches into the wall of flesh – it then began to pull Speaker and Sunrise up, as Gift’s rotating blades chewed through the surface of the dry flesh without being able to dig further in because it was attached to Speaker’s hoof as if it was a gear running along the length of a machine, leaving behind a bleeding trail of torn flesh and splintered bone plates.

Like a gear going along an indented steel row Speaker quickly ascended, him and Sunrise quickly reaching the roof level. Red and Cash were both weaving and dodging from ghosts they could not see – but Speaker could… and it wasn’t pretty: War-ghosts, the spirits of fallen warriors who had died without being put to rest, able to attack with the weapons they died with without materializing…

Shimmer was having a far better time, her silvery talons trailing blue light as they cut through the swarming ghosts with ease, their vaporous and semi-transparent forms dissolving into puddles of ectoplasm that hungry skeletal limbs protruding from the roof scooped up and funneled into sphincters in the slabs of flesh…

Speaker joined the fight as quickly as he could, flinging Gift at the war-ghosts that were attacking Red. It was a testament to Red’s incredible fighting skills that she was to successfully duck, weave and parry attacks from foes she literally could not sense – and yet the only times they managed to hit her their ghostly blades only scraped along her lamellar armor, or left her tiny inconsequential superficial cuts.

Cash couldn’t hear the shrieks of the ghosts as Gift tore through their ethereal essence, enhanced by Speaker’s god killing charm that had previously made swift work of several water elementals. The ghosts that Shimmer tore through didn’t fare much better as she felled dozens with each slash of her claws, but it seemed as if hundreds of ghosts were pouring down from the upper levels – or just coming out through the walls – to join the attack… It was a strange silent battlefield against enemies that mortal eyes could not see.

Sunrise Glow stepped into the fray. Speaker shouted for her to get behind him, but she did not listen. By the might of her dedication and stubborn will none of the war-ghosts could touch her, for lo she was holy and she shined with a bright light and she was protected by a seemingly invincible ego shield, her desire to ignore these feeble ghosts made manifest through the might of her essence.

To Cash it just looked like the ghosts weren’t attacking her, while the rest of the circle was under constant attack – to Speaker, it appeared as if the ghosts could not hit Sunrise, despite Sunrise not even trying to dodge.

Clearing her throat, Sunrise suddenly began to sing a single long tone. To Cash and Red nothing really seemed to happen, although Red subsequently quickly noticed that the attacks she were fending off were losing coherence and coordination very quickly.

Speaker laughed, sending Gift flying once again. Sunrise was using the same strange charm she had used on the Bodhisatva – for the dozens of war-ghosts surrounding them were fleeing, as Sunrise’s simple act of singing somehow burnt every ghost in earshot as if struck with holy fire. Shimmer ran around in a frenzy as the ghosts fled, her long silvery talons ripping ghosts asunder left and right with an ease that Speaker had to admit was quite impressive – and equally intimidating.
Moments later the ghosts had scattered or sought refuge where they couldn’t hear Sunrise’s burning voice, and Speaker realized that the adolescent mare had maintained that single high note for almost a minute: “I think you can stop now… and maybe breathe?”

Sullen Hoof appeared, having apparently stayed out of sight somehow – and said that there was nothing on this level of the ziggurat of interest. He also noted that down on the ground on the opposite side there was a gate, but it was locked and bared – and evidently made of the same evil metal that the bodhisattva had used to trap foal-souls: soulmetal – so the gate was virtually indestructible.

“You’ve been busy” Red commented, giving Sullen Hoof a firm nod of approval.

Sullen Hoof shrugged: “Ponies always look at the fighting – not at the ones sneaking around behind them not fighting”
With the gate not much of an option, Shimmer did her limb-extending trick again – taking care to dodge the skeletal limbs that tried to grab at her - and checked on the second level roof for a way into the manse. This time there was plenty to see: “Walking skeletons, zombie-ponies and big stacks of flesh and bone slabs. They’re repairing the roof – there was a big hole. It looked like something had forced its way out from inside the manse”

The circle quickly moved up, Red and Sunrise coming up with Shimmer this time, while Speaker hauled Cash up with Gift embedded in the wall again.

Cash found this new use of Gift quite creative: “…and the new blade extension on the disc looks positively lethal, when did you come up with that?”

“I just remembered that I could. It’s part of a technique to enhance the cutting power of Gift, but this way it also digs into the flesh-wall and pulls us up – I’ll have to experiment with this later” Speaker said with a strained voice, finding Cash just that much heavier to hold on to.

On the second level Speaker arrived to find Red and Shimmer having cut down everything that moved. There were skeletal remains of ponies scattered everywhere, along with large slabs of dried meat etched with strange glyphs and similarly sized slabs of bone that Speaker had no idea where came from: “…bone doesn’t grow into building blocks. How did they make these?”

“Ya its weird – but it looks like they were repairing this hole here” Shimmer said, pointing a talon towards a large hole in the roof.

Red was about to push the remains of a zombie pony down to the first floor roof when Sunrise touched the corpse and reduced it to Ash: “Hey!”

“Be respectful of the dead – they are not toys” Sunrise said in a calm but scathing tone.

Red rolled her eyes and walked over to peek down the hole.

Speaker, Shimmer, Sully and Cash joined the warrior mare.

“It’s dark down there” Red bluntly stated, sounding disappointed that there wasn’t anything to hit.

Sullen Hoof sighed and leaned in over the hole: “To you, maybe – but not with my vision enhancement charms: I’m seeing… tables? Big ones, down on the ground level – there’s no first floor. I don’t see any movement”

Speaker mulled over the description for a few moments when suddenly a blur of motion shot up from the hole, striking Sullen Hoof so hard that the Night Caste pony tumbled over backwards, knocked out cold with blood pouring from his mouth, with what Speaker suspected was a broken jaw.

The brief moment spent considering Sullen Hoof’s wounds allowed the attacker to land behind Speaker and buck him into the hole. If not for the perfect balance charm Sullen Hoof had taught Speaker, he would have fallen – but this did leave Speaker balancing precariously on an exposed bone plate jutting out from the torn roof panels of flesh.

From behind him Speaker could hear Shimmer and Red charging this guardian of the manse, but by the time Speaker managed to find something to stand on, so he could turn around and step away from the hole, he found the fight to have taken a terrible turn for the worse:

Red was wriggling helplessly up in the air, held tightly by rusty chains that jutted out of the back of… celestia’s mercy – a dark warrior pony, not entirely unlike the Bodhisattva, but at least this time with no apparent sacrificed limbs replaced by ghostly gifts of the neverborn. Still, this pony stood firmly in sleek articulated soulsteel plate armor, wearing a helmet made to give the appearance of a smug grin, while a very nasty looking soulsteel glaive floated above him, ready to strike, swipe, chop or parry any incoming attack.

Shimmer was doing all of the attacking, but despite swiping furiously, or darting around and trying to catch the dark armored pony from a different angle, she was batted forcefully away each time by the shaft of the glaive.

Cash was curled up next to Sunrise, cowering in fear, while Sunrise seemed to be holding her mouth… and bleeding from it.
Quickly rushing over to Sunrise to help her, Speaker hurriedly asked what was wrong. She gave a muffled answer under her hood, pointing a bloody hoof over at the manse guardian. When Speaker turned to look he saw tiny letters of white light floating in the air forming around his field of vision: “One of the hooks on the end of the chains from the monster’s back. It cut my tongue, so I cannot talk”

Speaker quickly turned back to Sunrise: “Your tongue – let me see”

It wasn’t pretty. Sunrise’s tongue had almost been torn off – and when that hadn’t worked the hook that had caught it had simply cut its way around. It was a rough and jagged cut, very ugly: “I can’t fix this right now – just stay low”

There was a howling shriek from the fight behind Speaker, and upon turning to see Speaker saw to his terror the dark guardian twirl its glaive with lightning speed as it flickered with many shadows, slashing at Shimmer multiple times – the glaive leaving dark vapor trails as it coursed through the air, along with multiple trails of blood. Shimmer dropped to the ground, emitting a strange and very un-ponylike whine, more akin to that of a wounded bird of prey.

It wasn’t because that the scene was eerily familiar, indeed at least this time Shimmer hadn’t been cut in half – but Speaker still roared in a mix of fury, despair and anger, Gift zipping off at the dark warrior. The dark armored pony seemed to have expected incoherent rage and had held his guard appropriately for that, but it did not seem to expect the cold rage that Speaker exhibited: Gift swerved and flew around the glaive, not even trying to hit the dark pony, instead it zoomed past… right into the rusty chains, cutting into them with great force.

The dark pony twisted in attempt to dodge, but Speaker had flung Gift with a martial skill not seen in Creation for millennia, and Gift severed one of the chains holding Red. The part of the chain no longer connected to the dark pony’s back dissolved into a splattering of blood, allowing Red to wrestle the two remaining chains and free herself.

The dark pony remained still, the glaive twirling around to swipe at Red – cutting a deep gouge through Red’s armor into her left rear leg just as she was about to land, causing her to land hard on her side as her left rear failed to right itself.

“Wha- Who are you? Why are you doing this? Are you the guardian of this manse?” Speaker shouted, Gift having zipped back to his right forehoof.

Red staggered to her legs, but her left rear leg hung limply. Shimmer emitted a pained whine as she shapeshifted from her monsterpony form to her true form, that of a western mare the size of a filly.

The dark pony shifted its stance, the half length of chain jutting out of its back dissolving into blood. Its armor shifted to cover the tiny hole where the chain had come out from, and the pony began laughing from under its grinning mask: “Oh oh course – how rude to kill you before I tell you”

“I am He who Kills and Fears Nothing, the unkillable warrior of the night and I will now kill you all… not because I am to defend this place, but simply because I can” The dark pony said, pulling a hoof up to remove the front of his helmet…
Red groaned at the grim sight under the helmet: “Great, your face is cut off? We’ll we’ll see about killing you alright… I mean, someone’s already been chopping bits off of you”

Speaker shook his head – he couldn’t see what Red had seen, but it was obvious to him what they were facing: “You’re another deathknight, aren’t you? Like the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes”

“True, but enough talk. I’m not one to stall to live a few moments longer… for unlike me, you’re about to die” The fearless killer said, reattaching his mask in a swift motion, only to launch himself at Speaker.

Speaker braced himself and brought Gift up to parry the incoming blows, but Red leapt in the way, parrying Killer’s soulsteel glaive with her bare hooves – which where all sheathed in bright light. Speaker recognized it as the effects of using the Hooves of Iron technique as part of the Hoof of the Daystar style of martial arts. Truly, one had to respect the simpler techniques.

With this reprieve given by Red, Speaker noticed her limp leg. To Speaker’s trained physician eyes the damage was clear – and it made him marvel at Red’s ability to stay fighting, for it appeared that the leg had been severed at the hip bone, meaning that only skin and what little unsevered muscle that was left was holding the leg in place… which it was barely even managing to do.

Speaker quickly joined the fight again, flinging Gift at the merciless killer who kept shouting taunts at Red and Speaker while expertly dodging Gift and Red’s floating blade – which was quickly cut into pieces by Killer’s soulsteel glaive.

Seeing her blade destroyed did something to Red. Speaker, standing behind the warrior mare, could hear her cry of anguish as she dropped into a terrible martial trance – but he could also feel the air around her tense as her anima flared to its full terrifying totemic glory: A golden fountain of light erupted around Red, revealing that telltale circle of glowing symbols – a full bagua – and above each symbol hovered different weapons of pure light… and what happened next took only a few scant seconds.

First Red gestured at the short sword, sending it flying at the killer – who brushed it aside with the sturdy shaft of his glaive. Next Red sent the glowing katana at the Killer, then the maul, the axe, the spear and even flinging the bladed horseshoes at the deathknight – who quickly had to use actual effort to avoid getting hit. Finally Red drew the glowing bow and fired a single arrow of furious white light …. And another, and another – all so quickly that one would easily mistake Red to have only fired one arrow – but Red wasn’t done. Upon leaving the bow of pure essence each arrow split into three more, peppering the oh so fearless killer with armor piercing target arrows that each blazed with the righteous fire of Red’s martial passion and fury. This entire barrage of attacks had taken but a scant few seconds.

Speechless – probably due to the arrow that had punched through his armor and lodged itself in his throat – the otherwise fearless killer made a gurgling sound and only after floating the arrow stuck in his throat out did the killer laugh mockingly and madly at Red, clearly banking on her being too weak to finish him off… despite her having just pinned him to the wall of the third level of the ziggurat.

Red, all her weapons having faded, dropped to her three good legs – trembling. Speaker could figure as much that Red had probably just spent every last mote of essence she had in her… but the killer wasn’t dead yet and Speaker could feel the murder in Red’s eyes even behind her.

Hobbling forward toward the Killer, who was still pinned to the wall, Red began to feebly pummel the deathknight. Her own wounds too great, and the deathknight’s soulsteel armor too thick, Red could do little to finish off her foe except shatter her stone shoes against the soulsteel plate armor – and even if he was all but defeated, every limb of the deathknight pinned and blood leaking profusely from his armor, then the dawn caste solar could not let this insult to her weapon and the offensive of hurting her friends go unpunished… especially since the bastard was still mocking her, even in defeat!

Speaker looked on with some measure of disgust as first Red ripped off the killer’s face-mask, revealing the grim visage of a pony’s head cut in half – with the face half missing entirely. The back end of the eye sockets had black pits of teeth that seemed to work as the killer’s neverborn-gifted eyes, while the entirety of its lower jaw was gone – making Speaker wonder how the monster had been able to talk. Above the blood-eyes was exposed grey matter, the brain of the deathknight…
"Let’s see how unkillable you really are!” Red shouted, her voice ragged.

Red began to punch the killer directly in the brain, causing the killer to spasm pitifully as its pinned limbs began to jerk around to each blow. After the sixth blow – nearly having caved in the killer’s skull completely - the limbs stopped jerking, the killer’s entire body going limp. A part of Speaker objected to this brutal execution, but it was easily ignored.

Approaching Red to treat her wounds, Speaker barely caught Red as her martial trance faded, reminding Red painfully that her leg was all but severed from her body. Speaker quickly hit her with his anesthetic charm before the pain set in, then putting her down on the ground and rushing over to Shimmer…

“Come on – be alive!” Speaker urged, checking for a pulse on Shimmer’s small body. To Speaker’s great relief she was alive, and her wounds weren’t that deep… but she was also conscious: “Why haven’t you used your regeneration charm?”
Shimmer groaned again, looking up at Speaker with tearful eyes: “He cut… he cut me”

Speaker had decades of experience with patients who were unable to verbalize their own injuries: He knew how to coax such information out of them – and with his exaltation he could with but a glance diagnose even the most well hidden of injury, however… here he only saw the flesh-wounds, the lacerations to Shimmer’s belly, sides and shoulder. Administering his anesthetic charm Shimmer sighed deeply and shook her head, beginning to cry. Speaker didn’t see the problem – Shimmer had shrugged off and regenerated far greater injury not an hour earlier when she had landed on her side and had her flesh withered by the corrosive essence sufficing the ground around the manse.

Sunrise came over to Speaker, along with Cash who was dragging the unconscious Sullen Hoof. Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, Speaker looked between Sunrise, Sullen Hoof and Red – then began to patch Red’s leg back together again, all the while wondering what was wrong with Shimmer.

After restoring Red’s leg to the point that she could at least put some weight on it – mainly via heavy use of essence-formed sutures and fast acting bone-adhesives – as well as stitching up Red’s flesh-wounds in the same way, Cash came over to Speaker: “I think I figured out what ‘s wrong with Shimmer”

Speaker was all ears as he began to work on Sullen Hoof’s thankfully not broken but dislocated jaw. Cash wasn’t sure how to word it, but he’d drawn a frightfully simple conclusion based on Shimmer’s apparent inability to use her own regeneration charm: “I think that Killer freak cut her in more than one way – not just her body – but her soul… cut away her ability to use charms”

Considering the suggestion, Speaker tried once again to talk to Shimmer – and indeed, Shimmer concurred that she was feeling a most horrifying void within her – her body drained of essence completely… but what was worse was that none of it was coming back. Cursing that he didn’t have essence sight like Shimmer had with her monsterpony form, Speaker closed his eyes and simply tried to feel the essence around Shimmer. There was hardly any…

“Wait, none? But… your soul, it breathes essence – if it’s all gone and not coming back, you should be dead” Speaker quickly pointed out.

Shimmer shook her head, speaking quietly: “A tiny bit… hardly any left. It’s so cold”

Feeling a pat on his shoulder, Speaker turned to see Sullen Hoof having regained consciousness. Sully gestured for Speaker to walk away from Shimmer for a moment: “I think I have an idea of what’s going on”

“We’ve figured that out already – The killer damaged Shimmer’s soul, so now she doesn’t have any essence left” Speaker said coldly, trying to mask his anger behind a façade of professionalism.

Sullen Hoof shook his head: “No no – I mean, why she’s reacting like this. Remember, she’s over a hundred years old… she’s been a lunar for a really long time – so this is probably the first time a very long time that she’s been this powerless, almost as if she’s a mortal again. If she’s been used to wielding essence for that long…”

“Let’s hope it’s not permanent” Speaker said, going back to Shimmer to patch up her wounds.

After having fixed Shimmer up to the best of his ability, and re-attaching Shimmer’s torn tongue so she could – to a very limited extent – speak, the question was what to do…

Red didn’t have much fight left in her, Shimmer had none, and Speaker was deeply worried.

Sunrise would have nothing of such pitiful behavior. Using a charm to cause her voice to magically come from around her, allowing her speak without using her mouth, Sunrise scolded Speaker for wanting to give up on assaulting the manse: “Come Speaker, you, me, Cash and Sullen Hoof are all ready and able – and if this dead deathknight and those ghosts were the only defenders of this horrible place, then we have won already. All we need to do is venture into manse and check for straglers – if there were more defenders, do you not think that they would have come to their ally’s aid during the fight?”
Speaker slowly nodded. Without Shimmer being able to use sorcery the circle was stuck halfway up the ziggurat anyway… so securing the location wouldn’t be that bad of an idea anyway.

A sudden clatter startled the circle, as the killer’s corpse suddenly fell to the ground – Red’s arrows of light having faded. However, upon hitting the roof four black tentacles of what looked like tar-smeared flesh shot up from the hole in the roof and snatched the body, dragging it down into the darkness.

“Looks like there’s still something down there… with tentacles” Sullen Hoof grimly pointed out, retrieving a pair of cleavers from elsewhere.