Winds howled across the jagged stone cliffs as Lucian crouched low on a narrow ledge, his cloak fluttering against the rock. Far below, the echo of booted footsteps and gleeful voices drifted upward.
He had been walking a day, he even slept through the night ontop a tree, he was accustomed to the cold so he survived. Until this day.
His gaze traced, dozens of warriors, hunters and mercenaries wandering… They strode across a overgrown valley floor, voicing there joyful thoughts outloud.
"I heard the weapons here can cut through energy barriers like paper," one man spoke out loud.
Another warrior chimed in. "Not just weapons. I saw a man with a ring that could summon lightning! There's more in here than just blades."
"Heard the Black Swamp took my brother. If there's anything here that can control it, I'll find it."
Lucian's eyes narrowed as he remained motionless, hidden beneath the shadow of a jagged boulder. He knew that much, what they knew so he focused on them to learn something else.
Suddenly, one of the older men, his energy dense and corrupted out his body, laughed darkly. "You fools don't get it. Rumor is… there's a son of a powerful demon, came straight from the underworld to enter these lands."
In that moment, the group paused.
"A what?" one younger man asked.
"The son of a powerful demon," the elder repeated. "Born of hellfire and blood. Said to be exploring in this world. Protected. They say his Scarlett Heart an inherited power… the kind that would make anyone around him stronger."
They group then went silent as the tension rose from being terrified.
So his son here… Didn't think he would be willing to send him up despite out deal. Not to return to earth and we have no trouble. Is that why the Black Swamp is getting more wild?
Still, before anyone could question further, a faint flicker of energg sparked… from a man at the back of the group stiffened, his eyes scanned the cliff walls.
At that moment a pulse was sent to his mind like able detect a eye on him.
"There… !" he growled, pointing upward. "Someone's watching us!"
Lucian tensed, knowing it was too late.
Suddenly, something blur ahead on him, a flick of steel. As the man leapt, Lucian instantly sprang back, barely avoiding their blade that shattered the rock where he'd just been crouched.
All member of the group head snapped upward.
"There he is! Alone!"
"He has something! Look at his eyes… those aren't human!"
At the same time the cliff exploded, from the energy from the warriors bodies that rushed into action, leaping, climbing, soaring up with footwork techniques and grappling hooks imbued with energy threads. Lucian turned on his heel, wind swirling as he dashed across the cliff edge.
"Give us what you have!" a man roared behind him.
Lucian's jaw tightened, jumping from one crumbling outcrop to the next. A gust of energy wind pushed him forward, but arrows rained from below, one grazing his shoulder.
A red-haired warrior with a jagged spear caught up fast, bounding beside him mid-air. "Hand it over, boy!" he spat, stabbing toward Lucian's chest.
Lucian ducked low, twisted, and held the man spear tip between his fingers… It came forward, then back at the man body as he easily controlled it, sending the man flying backward, screaming.
He didn't wait, he continued to dash ahead.
"We split it six ways, yeah? Or seven if he survives long enough to bleed on it."
As a couple minutes passed, the chase tore through the forest and burst into a clearing. Lucian's eyes widened briefly ahead was a tower that rose like jagged teeth from the heart of a dead, gray bog, twisted trees.
The fortress looks more like a forgotten relic of the gods than anything built by man. Black stone tower unnaturally thin and tall, spiraling skyward in crooked angles. Vines soaked in blood-hued moss creep along its walls, and fragments of broken bell ropes dangle like nooses in the wind.
A black, brackish moat surrounded it, filled with still water that reflected nothing. The lone bridge to the fortress is a narrow chain of cracked stone slabs.
Lucian stormed through the shattered entrance, his boots skidding across the dust-covered tiles. Behind him, the remaining seven warriors roared, they were down one man. They didn't even know, where he was leading them.
"Nowhere left to run, fiend spawn!" one shouted, as lightning coiled around his arms.
Lucian whirled, narrowly dodging a storm fist that shattered the wall behind him. Dust erupted, the moment the tower trembled.
Another warrior lunged from his left, aiming a energy filled punch. He blocked with his forearm, his flex out his from the impact, then drove his knee into the man's gut. As the warrior reeled, Lucian snatched his wrist, twisted… and flung him down the staircase below.
"Kenny!"
The moment the warrior landed on the bottom and died, all other rushed wildly at him.
"You must die!"
Inside air was thick with cold and originally silent, broken only by the occasional groan from strained stone and the distant clang of chain. The tall archways were crumbling colonnades lead into vast, open chambers filled with the remains of shattered altars, rusted tools, and half-melted statues.
Massive gears and pulleys from long-dead machinery loom surrounded them, even cobweb-draped catwalks wind across great chasms.
"Stay close, Juno!"
"Why? So you can push me off like last time?"
"Tch. Should've let the swamp take you."
The warrior blades clanged against the towers stone wall. Everyone fists and feet attacked him. Lucian still ducked, weaved, striking with precision. The battle spiraled upward as they ascended the tower, stone stairs cracking beneath their feet.
"CRACK!"
Suddenly, a support beam snapped under their weight. The stairs collapsed, sending two warriors tumbling into the darkness below. Their screams echoed… however, cut off abruptly as died on impact.
A third warrior stumbled into a side chamber… only to vanish in an instant, from the corner of everyone eyes they saw him. Swallowed by a rippling black shadow that oozed from the walls like tar.
One man eyes widened. "Something's wrong with this place!"
However, they had no time to retreat. At the top of the tower, in a circular chamber open to the sky, hanged a enormous bronze bell, tarnished with age, filled with inscribed symbols.
Only three warriors remained with Lucian, circling him, they were exhausted, slowly down.
The leader had blood trailing from his mouth. "You die here."
He rushed in, and Lucian ducked under their strike, he delivered a counter-punch to the gut, causing the warrior to staggered back… his elbow clipped the bell.
"DONGGGGGG."
The bell sound thundered through the chamber, but it wasn't pure. All of them clutched their heads as the sound burrowed into their minds like worms… It seemed the rang distorted them, warped like a scream from the void.
Lucian rapidly blinked, he smirked dropped as suddenly the air shimmered.
Under the bell a spirit emerged.
It gaunt and wailed, bound by rusted chains. Its hollow eyes scanned the room.
"Ekk!"
In that moment, in lunged before the warrior could do anything. It impaled them with its spectral claws, dragging him into the bell. Another tried to flee, only to be seized by a second spirit that crawled from the stone.
Lucian watched, as his lips formed a smirk.
So the bell calls them...
He moved fast… weaving through the chaos. "Still want what I've got?" he mocked.
The man roared, rage overriding his fear, however, mid attack Lucian doged causing the man glaive to slam against the bell.
"DOOOOOOONGGG."
The bell screamed louder than before, from its underneath, a flood of chained spirits spilled out, dozens of them, their wails deafening everything. The warrior froze… then they tore into him, ripping flesh from spirit, devouring him whole.
Lucian stood alone, chest heaving.He looked at the bell. Its surface was cracked now...
"I won't ring it again," He whispered to the dead. "But someone will."
Lucian had heard tales of towers like this, but none had returned from them sane. Now he understood why.
He stepped toward the broken ledge of the tower. He stared into the abyss below, the wind tugged at his tattered cloak.
His lips curled into a interested smirk. "He began to feel bored, huh…?"
He exhaled slowly, he took one step back.
And, suddenly he leaped off the tower into the fading dusk, vanishing into the mists below.