Lineage

Deciding that I wanted this key hunting bullshit over and done with as soon as possible, I made the decision to not rest up at the house we’d requisitioned, and instead to head straight for the next key fragment. This whole adventure was nearly done and dusted, and I was more than eager to get whatever treasure was stored down here… though I would be a liar if I said I wasn’t curious as to what happened in this place. The whole city gets abandoned by its people and a curse is cast over the whole city that exempts the Highmoore themselves? This whole situation was pretty bizarre, not even mentioning the fact that these Highmoore warriors, guardians of the key fragments, keep referring to me as champion. Rinvae had made mention to the reward, probably whatever treasure was down here, but Vilthrette had said nothing. She never spoke to me beyond the mental imprint thing. I put a hand to my face and sighed, wiping the sweat off my brow with a dusty glove as I made my way across the city, trying to find another important-looking area to kill the final guardian.

My eyes scoured as far as I could see in the dark city, noticing the strange magic lamps that gave off a faint green glow, giving the streets below an ominous, almost goblin-like appearance, as the green light shone against the black stone. With a shake of my head, I kept moving forward, progressing to high towers and wide areas, trying to find the third guardian. As I progressed through the city, I came across something I was surprised I’d never found before:

The lower levels.

The city, as I’d been told by Svea, was an inverted cone shape that burrowed deeper into the ground, with the deeper areas of the city being restricted to the more high class individuals of the Highmoore. I discovered just how deep the city went when I nearly went careening off the side of the building I was on, grinding to a halt as I realised there was nothing left to jump across to.

“Fucking hell!” I exclaimed in surprise, skidding to a stop just before the edge. I dropped into a low crouch and turned around slightly, preparing to grip the edge of the roof if I should skid slightly further, but thankfully that move wasn’t necessary. I remained completely still for a long moment, taking a deep, shaky breath before standing straight and peering over the edge, staring into the abyss. The first thing that stuck out to me down there was how bright it seemed to be. There was architecture illuminated by brilliant golden lights, several much higher quality buildings dotting each of the lower slants of the city as it spiralled further and further down into the earth. I followed the bottom spiral all the way back up to the top, seeing it come to a stop at a big, wrought-iron door.

“Well…” I said, leaping over rooftops and down to the ground, coming to a stop in front of the door. “I’m guessing I’ve found where the keys go?”

I traced over the door with my hands, squinting to try and make out any kind of keyhole in the dimly-lit area. I eventually found one, and found that it wasn’t the one I was looking for. The keyhole wasn’t the same cylindrical shape of the key fragments I’d found. In fact, I’d struggle to even call it a keyhole. It was a notched hole in the door in a triangular shape, with what appeared to be both writing, and an illustration of the object I needed being held aloft by what looked like a female, judging from the long hair and hourglass figure (Highmoore were stacked, go figure), with the image of a large, church-like building. I ran my hand through my hair, sighing loudly as I put the clues the image was giving me together:

“So… whatever I need is being held by some woman in a big church?” I asked myself in a questioning manner. “Right. So… let’s find me a church…”

I turned around, facing back into the higher levels of the city as I looked around for the large church, trying to make out the spire of the building in the darkness of the city. Spotting what I believed to be the building, I began the trek to the building just visible over a large distance away. The journey itself took no longer than a few minutes and I was soon standing at the door of the church. The ancient spire of the church stood tall and proud, with symbols of a language I didn’t recognise carved into the doorway in an extremely intricate manner, the carvings being written in a cursive too elegant for regular chiselling, and instead seemed like they were written into the stone by hand.

I stepped inside the church and was greeted by both a familiar and unfamiliar sight. The first familiar sight was the door closing behind me, leaving me trapped in here with whatever man o’arms was ready to chop me into pieces. The unfamiliar thing was the thing sitting on a wooden chair in the middle of the empty church. I slowly walked towards the figure, keeping my eyes peeled for any sign of hostile behaviour, as I got a good look at it. She was definitely female, clad in black armour that was made up of many smaller plates, almost like a dragon’s hide, with a large cloak hanging over her shoulders, the hood pulled up to obscure her face. On her hip was a long, thin blade in a scabbard made of the same material as her armour, inscribed with symbols from the Highmoore language. I could see one of her gloved hands resting on the armrest, knuckles spiked with sharp, pyramids of black metal, designed for maximum damage upon striking. She lacked a shield or any sort of defensive weapon, but had a large dagger strapped on her left hip, the hilt’s intricate design visible inside the ragged cloak.I took another step towards her, this one seeming to disturb her, lifting up her head and sending a shock through my system at what I saw:

The most striking thing about her was her skin. It was a shade of pale baby blue, thick lips an almost-white shade of blue. Her face was one of true beauty, with sharp cheekbones and eyes similar to the shape of those found on women in the far east, with burning blue irises that seemed to stare into my very soul. While the beauty she possessed was beyond mortal women, in the same way that alicorns were more attractive than humans ever could be, it was marred by something I could only describe as an affliction. Her entire face was covered in black, vein-like scars that streaked across her face, the sclera of her eyes a black almost too dark to comprehend. Her entire expression seemed to be filled with pain and anguish as she stared at me, tilting her head sideways as she studied me.

She lifted a shaking hand up to her hood, seeming to struggle with the motion as her hand shook and twitched as it moved upwards, eventually being able to grasp the hood and remove it from her face, revealing a set of long, pointy ears and snow-white hair, tied back into a ponytail. As she stared at me, I could feel her presence in my mind, moving through my consciousness in search of something. Her mouth twitched and her lips pursed several times, before a grin spread onto her face as she found what she was looking for.

“Ahh,” she sighed in a firm tone. “A tongue I’ve never encountered before.”

“You… how can you speak it if you’ve never heard it?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

“I learned it from you,” she said, pushing herself out of her seat and trying to steady herself as she got up. “I’ve taken the knowledge from your mind to ask something of you.”

“You can in a second,” I said. “But first explain to me why the others I’ve fought didn’t do the same thing you just did.”

“Because they could not,” she said, shaking her head. “My fellow Elves weren’t as gifted with the Essence as I am… no, your kind refers to it not as the Essence, do they? What do you call it… magic? Bah, such a ridiculous word for Their power.”

“Their?” I asked in confusion. “Who’s Their?”

“So it’s true…” she sighed, hanging her head in what seemed like remorse. “Their Majesties truly have abandoned this world.”

“Are you going to answer any of my questions?” I asked. “Or are you just being mysterious because you want to?”

“The answers will be revealed to you soon enough, Champion,” she said, looking up at me again. “But before that happens, you must defeat me, claim the last key, and destroy the monster we so foolishly created.”

“Alright then,” I sighed, having heard enough stories from Luna to know I wasn’t getting anymore answers out of her without completing this little quest I was on. “Do you have a name?”

“I do,” she nodded. “My name is Elisa, the one who shall test your worth… and the one who must see you succeed where I have failed. For the good of our race and the grace of The Mothers… wherever they are now.”

“Here’s hoping,” I said, drawing my sword and gripping the hilt tightly. “Shall we begin?”

“Indeed we shall,” she nodded, once again having her hands seem to resist her commands as she moved it towards the hilts of her weapons, drawing them both from the sheath and taking up a combat stance.

“With the eyes of the Great Mothers on us both,” she sighed, “I judge you in the name of the Highmoore Royal Guard. Have at you!”

Despite her grand speech and fearsome looks, there was something wrong with her. She moved forward slower than she seemed to want to, swung with so little power that it was nothing more than a joke to deflect her blows. The stress and anger brought on by her lack of power was visible on her straining face. I was able to sidestep the fallen warrior with nary any effort and it would be unbelievably easy to behead her and be done with this farce. I took a deep breath, shaking my head and deciding to keep my honour, letting her fight as much as she could before using a basic manoeuvre to disarm her. The sword skidded across the floor with a loud scrape, the disheartened look on Elisa’s face almost breaking my heart. Luna had told me of this happening before: the sad story of a warrior who continues to fight past their prime to the point where they can barely raise their weapon. Elisa seemed to be so damaged by whatever condition ailed her to the point where she couldn’t stand up for herself any more than a child could. I needed to end this fight here and let her die a warrior’s death to avoid her shaming herself any further.

“Tell me, child,” she said, turning to look at me. “Is it true that the Great Mothers have abandoned this world?”

“I’ve never heard of them and my family has never mentioned them before,” I answered truthfully. “It’s been a long time since the Highmoore around so maybe your religion was lost to the ages?”

“I see… then if the Mothers truly have given up their positions as guardians of this world,” she said, gritting her teeth and looking at her sword. “Then there is no more danger in committing the sin they damned us for to begin with.”

I was confused as to what she meant at first, seeing her merely bring her arms close to her chest, but as soon as she made her next move, I understood what she meant. She flung her arms outwards, and an enormous explosion of black sludge and muck erupted from around her, her eyes being completely swallowed by the blackness, and the vein-like scars on her face began to pulse as something was pumped through them. She turned to look at me, her head lashing around at great speed as she bared her previously-unnoticed fangs at me in rage. She then launched herself across the room, still moving in the stilted, puppet-like manner, but at over ten times her original speed. She snatched her sword from the floor and landed in a squared crouch holding her dagger, now visible as a hilted fang of some sort up by her right shoulder and her sword, both now pulsing with the same black ooze, out towards me.

“Defend yourself, boy,” she snarled. “As now your test truly begins.”

“Oh fuck,” I sighed, gripping my sword with both hands and preparing myself for whatever the hell she had up her sleeve now. The first thing I noticed about the semi-transformed Elisa was how unbelievably fast she was. She was able to cross the room towards me in a few seconds and launch a brutal stream of attacks with no chance of blocking them. I dodged to the side of the stream of slashes, attempting to slash her in the back, only to have her whirl around and used her dagger to knock my hand down and out of my attack before slamming her spiked knuckles into my chest, cutting deep into the leather and sending me flying back with a loud cracking noise. I was immediately knocked on my back, barely managing to roll backwards in time to avoid a plunging attack from her. I lunged forward, attempting to hit her in the face with the pommel of my sword only for her to reach forward with the hand that clutched the dagger and catch my wrist before releasing her sword entirely, grabbing hold of my arm with both hands and throwing me across the room.

I landed hard on the stone floor, skidding for several feet, as Elisa picked up her weapon from the floor and launched her dagger at me. I had less than a second to roll my ass away from that throw and even less time to get up and recover.

I managed to do half of that.

I got up, sure, but wasn’t able to recover before a vicious jump-kick from Elisa sent me blasting back into the wall, knocking the wind out of me and the impact of my head hitting the wall split the skin open, feeling agonising pain, warm blood, and a loss of direction all at once. I dropped hard down onto my stomach, the wind thoroughly knocked out of me by both impacts and, as much as I tried to, I couldn’t bring myself to stand. I could hear a disappointed sigh from Elisa as she walked slowly over to me, dragging the tip of her sword across the stone and producing a loud scraping noise as she did so.

“Another failure,” she sighed, stopping in front of me and raising her sword up into the air. “And now you’ll join the rest of those who have failed to pass this test. I’m sorry, young man.”

I tried desperately to move, trying to force myself to roll, punch, kick, skid, or shout to get her to stop before she landed the killing blow, but nothing mattered. My body wouldn’t respond to my commands, making me fear that the impact had possibly damaged my spinal cord, and all I was able to do was wait for the end. I looked up at the Highmoore, her cursed, black eyes staring down at me with an almost sorrowful gaze, before she drove the sword she held tightly downwards, the blade piercing through my armour, skin, muscle…

And straight through my heart.