Dark Age Legends

[Dude Man]

-- Terian, Outside Kainengrad --

"Excellent, this will do very well." Marshall said to Ein.

"Alright, good luck everyone." Duilin said. "Marshall you stay here. Alright, let's get started. Distracters whenever you're ready raise a little hell, Marshall start shooting and the then the rest of us will sneak in. Me, Valos, Doriana and who else are going to be sneaking in?"

[Xorlak]

- Kainengrad, Supply Storehouse -

"There.  All the minerals you ordered, Cap'n."

"Excellent."  Vincent rubbed his chin.  "Move them to my airship.  And one more thing.  Inform your Captain that I will be taking Kainengrad's NGO."

"I... beg your pardon?"  The supply officer gave Vincent a blank look.

"It is a code word you needn't concern yourself with.  Your Captain will know what it means and where it is located.  I have authorization."

"Yes, Cap'n."

Mikail waited for the armored supply officer to leave down the hall before turning to Vincent. "NGO?  Isn't that...?"

"Yes.  That was what the letter was about.  I now have full research and utilization authorization over all three that remain.  It was no coincidence that the message was delivered here.  One of the three is under heavy guard beneath this city."

[Drannic_Lord01]

-Terian, Kainengrad -

"Right mates... let's go!" With that, Jacobie raced out in front of the fortress, digging his katana through the hardened earth as he went across it. A sort of fissure opened up and followed the katana, closing from the back and opening in the front. He then slashed up as the fisure burst up a giant blast of rock and earth, flying towards the fortress, nearly as powerful as ship cannons.

The two Drannivolka both combined power and cast the sky apart with an air spell. It seemed as if a sort of blight in the sky took across an already blighted land. The sky darkened and almost purely pitch black clouds started to pour rain from above. As it rained, an occasional bolt of lightning hit the ground within the fortress every 2-3 seconds or so.

Doriana cast an illusion spell that hid herself from visibility, along with Duilin and Valos. The three could see eachother, however. "That will work for about half an hour. We'll want to get in there as quick as possible..."

[D. Ein]

-=Kainengrad - Outer Premises=-

The rocks flung by Jacobie struck the grim walls, creating shallow cracks here and there. At best, the rocks served to weaken the stone defences - it would take at least four other attacks like that to make a breach in the wall. The thunderstorm's lightnings were attracted to the tall guard towers of the city, but the towers showed no sign of damage from the electrical blasts.

-"That's some fancy skill there," Ein remarked. "Those clouds should be useful for covering our entrance."

He picked up several rocks from the ground, stashing them in a fold in his cape. Feeling his belt, his hand comfortably wrapped around a metal dagger that he acquired from a stash in the boat. That'll do for creating glyphs. With thoughts of glorious battles, he made his way to the distant gates.

[Approaching Kainengrad - 13]

-=Kainengrad - East Gate=-

Two sentries were relaxing inside one of the guard towers. One was idly toying with his bow, and the other one, a stout bearded one, was reading a book.

-"Say, Vance," one of them spoke. "What are we watching for? This is the capital of the 7th Regiment. Only an idiot would attack us, considering that we have an army of 3,000 backing us..."

-"Hurmh", the other grunted. "That idiot'd better have a big army."

Suddenly, a bolt of lightning struck the top of the tower, filling the guard room with thunderous noise. Both of the guards jerked to their feet, only to be knocked back down by the walls rumbling to enormous boulders striking them.

-"Sun-of-a-gun," the bearded Vance murmured. "Speak of the devil..."

Dropping his book, he dashed to a mouthpiece in one of the windows of the tower. The mouthpiece was connected to a brass horn curving downwards in a spiral, snail-like fashion, and ending in a large opening curved outward. After gathering as much air as his mighty lungs could hold, he blew into the mouthpiece.

A three-note roar as loud as a dragon penetrated the city, heard clearly even on the opposite end of Kainengrad. Guards on duty recognized the note of the east gate towers, and rushed to offer their assistance. The rest of the City Guard began to mobilize as well.

[City defences - 15]

[Dude Man]

-Terian, Kainengrad outside -

"Only half an hour?" Duilin said. "Hope that's enough. Let's move quickly."

Duilin and Valos then dashed their way towards the gates.

"We'll have to fly over the walls probably. That won't interfere with the invisibility, will it Doriana?"

---

-Terian, Kainengrad Command Centre -

"Cap'n Nex, sorry to disturb you but..." The supply officer came into Nex's room, where he was sitting at his desk, which was cleared off and he was cleaning it with what looked like a dark red cloth. "Umm...Cap'n Vincent was 'ere and he wanted me to tell you he's taking the NGO."

"What?" Nex looked at him and tossed the cloth into the wastebasket next to his desk.

"Is a code word I needn't concern myself with. My Cap'n will know what it means and where it's located. Vincent 'as authorization." The supply officer replied.

"I know what it is idiot. But it's my NGO, and I need more than his word that he has authorization. I've heard that Vincent is always up to betrayal and shit." Nex remembered that he actually served his now deceased masters, Abodahon and Melkoth, in the Grey Empire after betraying Draven. And Vincent would likely know all about the NGOs and judging by his past actions he needed to make sure he had authorization.

"Well, that's all 'e said."

Nex stormed through the doorway pushing the officer aside. "Get out of my way, I'm going to talk to him. Close the door behind you and make sure it doesn't hit your ass when you do, I just cleaned it."

---

- Kainengrad, Supply Storehouse -

Suddenly out of nowhere a large gust of wind rushed through the storehouse, startling half of the people inside. Leaves and twigs blew inside and the door swung open, following the light debris was a large black tattered rag that flew inside. The wind then started to circle around in a whirlwind in front of Vincent, with the black rag spinning around, until after a few seconds it died and the rag unfolded in a larger pile of rags, with a tall man-shaped being under them.

Nex looked down at Vincent. "Greetings Captain. I am Nex, Captain of this regiment, one of my supply officers says you have authorization to have access to my NGO. I'd like to see it, and then we can talk about giving it to you."

Nex pressed his fingers together and pushed them lightly and then clenched his hands.

"You see, I can't just simply hand over the key which unlocks the storage which contains one of the most deadly weapons know to Gaian to any captain with a naughty past that asks for it."

[Xorlak]

- Kainengrad, Supply Storehouse -

Vincent raised a brow slightly, but seemed generally unconcerned at the slight remark. "Of course."  He flipped his trench coat open, revealing a long cylindrical tube-like weapon of shiny material.  He reached into the pocket next to it and removed a scroll-case, handing it to the demon.  "From the Sovereign herself."  He gave Nex the separate authorization form Gwenivere included, rather than the personal letter addressed to him.

At that moment, an odd three-note horn resonated from the outside.  "What was that?"  Vincent demanded, looking to the distant window high above.  Storm clouds had rolled in, and the clamor of thunder could be heard.

"Is that... the attack siren?"  Mikail ventured, trembling and standing close to Vincent.  The alchemist gave him a cold glare and he backed up a step, regaining his composure.

Soldiers began to quickly move through the storehouse, running outside.  "What is going on?"  Vincent demanded of Nex, looking up at him over the rims of his rectangular glasses.

[D. Ein]

-=Kainengrad - Inner Courtyard=-

The lightnings, while seemingly not growing worse, began to spread outward from where the storm was originally summoned. Suddenly, a split lightning strike hit Vincent's airship, igniting its wooden masts. Its crew was quick to abandon the burning husk - but the ship began to descend as the fires reached its flotation crystals. Finally, it struck the ground, perishing in a blazing inferno. The rain from the thunderclouds was quick to douse the flames, preventing the fire from consuming the rest of the city.

The many guards set up even more sentries around the East Gate, specifically, but a lighter security patrol was established throughout the rest of the city, as well. Many guards, mixed with actual soldiers of the Seventh Regiment, continued to arrive from beneath the city.

[City defenses - 25]

-=Kainengrad - Outer Premises=-

Ein accelerated as he saw the storm crawling forward. Scaling the walls with lightnings a mere ten feet away did not seem like a good idea, so it would be best to get there before the dark clouds enveloped the city entirely.

Although the bulk of the storm was confined to where the Drannivolkans spawned it to, the rest of the sky grew black as well. The tightly localized weather disturbance caused a much larger chain reaction in the atmospheric systems, it seemed - now it was impossible to fully get rid of the storm the way it was made.

[Approaching Kainengrad - 2/3]

-=Kainengrad - Supply Storehouse=-

Nex and Vincent were too busy in conversation to notice a familiar (to Vincent, anyway) shadow emerge from the human turbulence of soldiers running past. The half-masked Stalker, this time without saying anything, stuck a bulky, well-protected looking scroll into Nex's hands. The signet seal atop the scroll was Gwenivere's. Without giving the demon time to reply, the Stalker merged with the crowd and vanished as swiftly as he appeared.

To Nex, Captain of the Seventh Regiment - CONFIDENTIAL, EYES ONLY

Nex - I need you to come into contact with Gros Morne immediately. Be alone, mention this to no one, do not be seen, heard, or followed.

The Sovereign

Note: My scribe put the glyph below to immolate this message within 10 seconds of air exposure.

//Note: Since the city of Gros Morne is gone, that title now refers to the fortress. Also, the message does not mean Nex has opened it yet - he can just walk away with the scroll and open it later.\

[Dude Man]

- Kainengrad, Supply Storehouse -

Nex examined the scroll and read it. "Looks legitimate. However there is one problem with getting the NGO you s--"

Suddenly the siren went off and he tilted his head. He looked back at Vincent. "My, my, it seems this fortress is under attack. It's likely another group of angry lizard men from Lizaberg, we've been teasing them a lot, hehehe."

Nex leaned in closer.

"If you'd like to help out it would be appreciated, but I know your sel-- erm, busy man so I'll let you get the NGO first and choose to help out later. Although I like to keep somebody close to me around to get the NGO."

He lifted his right hand and snapped his fingers and a bulky man, only a little shorter than the tall Nex came forward, as if he was in the room the entire time. He wasn't any regular man however. He was clearly a humanoid-demon. His skin was a dull red and he was bare chested, but was tattooed with pentagrams all over his body and had what appeared to be a series of nails sticking out of his shoulder, as if they were nailed in. He had curled goat horns and leather chaps, which had a rather disturbingly fleshy colour to them.

"This my lieutenant, Heric Dephiler." Nex said. "He has the means of unlocking where we store our NGO."

Lieutenant Dephiler nodded to Vincent and spoke with a deep but calm and quiet voice. "Follow me Captain." He then headed his way into the next room.

"As for me, I'm going to deal with our little problem here." He then left the storehouse, but noticed that a note had been planted on him. "Oh my, a love letter." He said with boyish enthusiasm. He unravelled the note, and read it. "Sounds juicy." The note then disappeared. He felt a rush of excitement. "Oh my, my! Get out of my way everyone!" He shouted and then dashed back towards the command centre, after a few steps he jumped into the air and transformed into the familiar large black rag and was carried away by the speedy gust of wind..

[Drannic_Lord01]

- Terian, Kainengrad -

"No. Flying won't interfere with the invisibility, as far as I know... but how?" Doriana crossed her arms as she ran close behind Duilin and Valos. As she ran, her katar was outstretched to her weapon side and angled down, her body angled forwards. It was a sort of force of habit.

Meanwhile, Jacobie impaled his sword into the ground again and brought it across, running towards the city walls again. As he was just in front of the walls, he let his katana fly up and create yet another fissure, blasting up large boulders and chunks of rock flying towards the wall and smashing into it with more force than the last blow. Maybe if he repeated this two more times, he could breach a large section in the wall, or so he figured.

John and Marrick continued to support the lightning spell as the clouds above them densly thickened and more lightning blasts fell from the sky inside the fortress of Kainengrad. The spell's effectiveness was starting to get a slight bit better and the radius of effect was increasing, moving from the towers and into the fortress' main buildings.

[Dude Man]

- Terian, Kainengrad -

"Excellent." Duilin then jumped in the air and spread open his wings and flew into the air, flapping his wings.

Valos followed by surrounding himself in a glowing purple aura, which was still invisible to everyone, luckily.

The two flew over the walls of the fortress and landed on the ground.

"Alright, we should probably find a place to hide so we can move around more stealthy, perhaps from building to building and such." Duilin suggested, whispering to the others, just in case the spell didn't muffle any sounds.

---

Meanwhile, the Kandarinian guards in the towers were getting pecked off from what appeared to be by snipers hiding all around the place. Yet it was simply Marshall hiding in a gathering of boulders in the hills...

[Drannic_Lord01]

- Terian, Kainengrad -

Jacobie repeated his fissure technique again, digging his blade into the crusted earth, then slashing up and generating a fissure that spewed giant debris of earth and boulders at the walls again. He flipped his katana around to his side once again and ran back from the wall to repeat the technique one more time.

Meanwhile, Doriana had silently leapt up the wall using her assassin jumping skills. She landed on the other side softly and quietly, sneaking up on Duilin and Valos. They most likely were suprised by her as she spoke. "The spell has about 20 minutes left... but I say we should just stick to the walls of the buildings and the fortress. That would probably be our best bet to avoid contact with hostiles."

[D. Ein]

//Wait a second - Doriana is an assassin, right? How did she use a holy attack on Kronos earlier?\

-=Kainengrad - East Gate=-

The pounding of the boulders at the stone walls had an almost shell-shock like effect on the soldiers waiting behind the east gate. Gaven's subdivision was the only one there at the moment, consisting of some 30 soldiers. The environment did little to ease the tension of the fighters, who were not used to fighting in the rain; rain in this location was very rare. Gaven knew that his men would give it their best, but he could not help but doubt whether their best would be enough against this kind of foe. There were no cannons sighted outside the fortress-city, but something was striking the walls with enough force to the point of nearly crumbling.

And that was not even all. Gaven flinched, remembering a scene he will not forget soon: guards falling off the walls with holes in their heads, one by one. All but the last one fell without knowing what hit them - the final guard managed to yell "The - the hills! They're in the hills!" before falling dead, blood trickling from his forehead.

Gaven knew - the Kandarinian spyglasses were powerful. Despite this, no matter how hard his scouts looked through the hidden, protected openings in the walls, they could not see the mysterious gunmen anywhere in the hills. All they saw was a cloaked human and a large lizard man. As long as they had cover, Gaven decided against sending any men outside the walls.

His train of thought was interrupted by a splash behind him. Gaven's men were told to stay put - it could not have been them... and yet, there was nothing behind him. No... no, there was something... it's hard to see, but definitely there...

-"GUARDS!"

The word shot through the soldiers' ears, jerking them out of their oblivious state. 30 spear guns clicked into ready positions, all aimed at the disturbance in the rain behind the gates.

[City defenses - 35]

-=Kainengrad - Rooftops=-

The lightnings sliced the sky like jagged slashes from a serrated dagger, and struck the tallest Kainengrad buildings like stealthed arrows, thundering only after the contact with the victim. Apophis watched the spectacle from a roof, having completed his job of delivering both scrolls to their recipients. He was not in a rush to get back to Gros Morne - aside the occasional riot, everything was quiet in the Kandarinian territories. This was so much more fun...

The Stalker nearly fell off his roof when he saw three "invisible" people plop down behind the gate. What kind of mage did they have that cast invisibility spells during rain? They may be bending light around themselves, but they remain solid - and the curtain of falling water easily gave away their position as silhouettes of emptiness where raindrops were supposed to fall.

For now, he decided not to interfere. It would be good to scale the attackers' battle prowess before engaging combat... picking prey larger than he could handle was never Apophis' style.

-=Kainengrad - Outer Premises=-

-"Lu lu lu," Ein mumbled to himself. "La la la. Kandie walls be falling down. I think your method is a bit too brute there, bud. Look - the walls shattered. The only thing keeping them up still is their weight. What you're doing right now is trying to knock over a pile of sand; kind of difficult, no? Let me help out."

With those words, Ein took out a stone that he picked up earlier, and using his dagger, started etching a series of lines on the rock.

[Approaching Kainengrad - 33]

[Xorlak]

- Kainengrad, Supply Storehouse -

Vincent followed the lumbering demon at a distance, Mikail close by him.  "I don't like this..." Vincent said under his breath.  The explosions were getting more intense.  And that was clearly no natural storm brewing outside.

"Me neither," Mikail whispered.  He was nearly hugging Vincent again before a glare from the alchemist made him jump back a pace.  "I mean, it's an awful coincidence this attack occurs when we arrive."

"Indeed... they may somehow know about the NGO and wish to take it before us...  We'll leave as soon as we get it.  Before the main attack force arrives.  My ship can outrun any paltry toys the Federation is capable of throwing at us."

[Dude Man]

- Kainengrad, Supply Storehouse -

Along his belt, Dephiler had a series of keys, connected to chains, a lot of them looked very similar and many of them were in fact useless, he had this to throw people off, if anyone tried to steal his keys. He took one of the keys and attempted to open a steel door buried in the back of one of the storage rooms he lead the other too, he fidgeted with it, but realized he took out the wrong key. He over-security fooled even him sometimes. He grabbed a different key, which was the correct one and opened the door, leading too a short dimly lit hallway with a staircase at the end.

"It's a little dark down here for a little while, and really messy." The demon said, softly. "Just follow me exactly, and you won't trip over anything. Okay?"

---

- Kainengrad, East Gate -

"You know..." Valos said, not bothering to hide his voice, looking at the several spear guns pointed at them. "I think they might see us."

"Let's not give up yet." Duilin ordered.

"Well, what the fuck do we do now!?" Valos snarled. "They got us! Leave it up to some witch you barely know to make us invisible."

"Calm down." Duilin demanded, but not raising his voice. "They can only see us because of the rain, we're just nearly invisible right now...Hmm. Maybe if we find cover or move quickly enough we can avoid getting attacked, then we'll find a spot to hide."

"Fine, let's just run." Valos then began to make a quick dash through the area, Duilin rolled his eyes and then followed. They figured if they were going to shoot at them, they would still be extremely hard to hit because a) the rain makes it harder for them to see, b) they're nearly invisible and c) they're running really fast...

[D. Ein]

-=Kainengrad - East Gate=-

It took Gaven a second to realize that the shadows in the rain began moving. Without losing another precious moment, he yelled the order to his men:

-"Fire at will! Shoot them down, impale them!"

The air became rife with the distinct buzzing noises of spears zooming through the air. Unfortunately, the massive amounts of water made it very difficult for the Kainengrad soldiers to see, and the hoods they draped over themselves to manage the rain did not exactly help the problem of visibility. The spears struck houses, stone walls, the ground - in other words, everything but the intended targets. Gaven cursed loudly, spat on the ground, and grunted in a resigned tone:

-"Stand down. We lost them."

Now comes the next fun part: reporting the failure to his superior.

Meanwhile, the city kept pumping soldiers from its underground Regiment 7 headquarters. Heavily armed Vanguards were now occasionally seen, sporting their enormous magic mortars as well as the recently introduced gargantuan Vanguard Claymores...

[City defenses - 45]

-=Kainengrad - Rooftops=-

So they take the coward's way out, and instead of standing their ground, they run. Not exactly an honourable decision, but very logical: being skewered by 30 obsidian-tipped spears is not something Apophis would care to describe as "fun". But regardless, the city guard (and even those clowns from the Seventh) were too incompetent to capture invisible foes, and the Stalker knew that. The next logical decision came right away: it's about time a Stalker actually performed the job they are named after.

It didn't take long for Apophis to sight his prey. Their clothes were still dripping wet, betraying the wearers with droplets of water seemingly from nowhere. The Stalker kept to the roofs, creeping close to the edge - allowing him to stay hidden behind the facades and decorations while having a good vantage point to spy the intruders from. They were running in a tight street below, covered from rain by a roof-formed canopy. Guards were running right past them, unable to spot the fine details of dripping clothes through their visored helmets; however, Apophis saw. And knew.

-=Kainengrad - Outer Premises=-

At last, Ein was finished with his stone-inscribed glyph.

-"Watch," he said, turning to Jacobie. "Fun little glyph I made up while in the Stalker academy. Don't ask."

He applied the glowing stone to the largest brick in the wall that was close to him. The stone immediately fell to the ground, almost hurting Ein's hand in the process. Unaffected, Ein proceeded to wrap his arms around the brick... and pulled it out. Moreover, he even balanced the large brick on one finger, as the damaged walls behind him finally gave in due to the disappearance of a major part of the foundation. The size of the brick easily suggested that it was at least 10 tonnes in weight, yet Ein was holding it like it was a feather.

-"Hehe, it's a weight transfer glyph," Ein giggled victoriously. "Now that tiny little rock there is as heavy as this brick used to be. Conversely, the brick became as light as a pebble."

Tossing the hulking brick aside, Ein made his way through the defeated walls.

...

Several clicks later, he made his way back out as fast as he could, chased by buzzing spears.

-"Crap..."