Gurok's breath came in heaving gasps, each exhale forming a cloud as he circled the Kuros-wielding knight. His battle-axe, its edge chipped from this exchange, felt unnaturally heavy in his grasp, the exhaustion of the prolonged duel weighing on him.
Around them, the battlefield lay strewn with fallen warriors, their blood staining the snow in crimson patterns. The knight, though, other than the arrow to the side was still looking strong.
Though his once-pristine armor was now dented a little, the knight commander still moved with precision, his greatsword humming with the dark energy of Kuros. The air around the blade shimmered and twisted, as if the air itself recoiled from its cursed edge.
A bitter wind howled across the battlefield carrying the metallic scent of blood and the distant cries of the dying. The knight rushed forward, his amoured boots crunching against the frozen earth, then pivoted into a vicious diagonal slash. Gurok barely managed to parry, the impact sending a jolt of white-hot pain through his already battered arms. The dark aura clinging to the blade seeped into his flesh like poison, a cold, creeping numbness sapping his strength with every exchange.
"You tire, beast," the knight taunted, his voice a venomous whisper beneath his ornate, helm. The slits of his visor gleamed with malice. "Your kind was never meant to stand against the blessed."
Gurok spat a glob of blood onto the snow, the red droplets melting tiny craters into the frost. His muscles burned, his breaths ragged, but his yellowed tusks remained bared in defiance. "Blessed?" he growled, tightening his grip on the axe. "You're just a man with a fancy sword."
The knight's response was immediate, a flurry of strikes, high, low, a spinning reverse-cut that forced Gurok into a desperate backstep. Dark Kuros trailed the blade, lingering in the air like afterimages of death, forcing the Krag to guess where the next attack would land. The snow beneath their feet churned into muddy slush, the ground torn by their relentless dance of steel.
Wosshh!
Another black-fletched arrow, loosed from the unseen archer, streaked toward the knight's side. But this time, he didn't flinch. His gauntlet flashed with a pulse of dark energy, and the arrow shattered mid-flight, its shaft bursting into useless splinters before it could pierce his armor.
Gurok seized the moment, his massive legs driving him forward with a roar. His axe, aimed to cleave the knight from hip to shoulder. The knight twisted at the last instant, letting the axe graze his pauldron with a screech of metal before retaliating with a brutal pommel-strike to Gurok's temple.
The Krag staggered, his vision swimming with black spots. The world tilted, the edges of his sight blurring. The knight pressed the advantage, his greatsword whirling in a deadly arc..
"Kuros- Partial Enchantment- Black Eruption."
Dark energy erupted from the blade, a swirling vortex of shadow that detonated in a small but devastating explosion around Gurok. The force lifted him off his feet, hurling him backward like a ragdoll. He crashed into the snow with a grunt, his body carving a deep furrow in the frost before skidding to a stop.
The knight raised his sword for the killing blow.
The knight advanced, his greatsword humming with renewed power, the dark aura around it writhing like living smoke. He raised the blade high, its tip gleaming under the twin sun.
"Die with honor, beast."
The blade descended
CLANG!
A cleaver, its edge sharp, intercepted the strike mid-air. Sparks erupted as steel met steel, the impact resonating like a struck bell. Arieus stood between them, his massive frame casting a long shadow over the bloodied snow. His muscles strained as he held the knight's blade at bay, his tusks exposed by a grin that widened with savage delight. With a roar, he shoved the knight back with sheer brute force, sending the armored warrior skidding several paces.
"My turn," Arieus utter in a deep, resonant voice. Rolling his shoulders as he adjusted his grip on his cleaver.
The knight recovered swiftly, his greatsword humming back to life, the dark Kuros coiling around it like a nest of serpents. "Another dog to put down," he sneered, his voice dripping with contempt.
Arieus chuckled, the sound deep and thunderous. Snowflakes began to fall and settle on his white fur cloak, as he took a step forward, his breath steaming in the cold. "You talk too much," he said, "for a man who's about to lose his head."
---
The knight attacked first, a blinding horizontal slash aimed at Arieus's throat. The blade sang through the frigid air, its edge shimmering with dark Kuros. The Krag war-chief ducked at the last possible instant, the steel passing so close it sheared a lock of his braided mane, the severed hairs drifting lazily to the snow. Before the knight could recover his stance, Arieus retaliated with a devastating upward cleave, the massive weapon cutting through the air with a thunderous whoosh. The knight barely managed to leap back, his armored boots skidding through the churned slush.
The knight's eyes narrowed behind his visor, assessing his opponent with newfound wariness. "You're faster than you look."
Arieus grinned, "And you're slower than you think."
"Really"
The knight's next assault was a masterpiece of swordsmanship, a fluid combination of slashes, thrusts, and feints, each strike enhanced by the writhing dark energy of Kuros. The aura lashed out like living tendrils, forcing Arieus to weave and block, his cleaver meeting every attack in a shower of sparks. The snow around them melted from the heat of their clashing steel, steam rising in ghostly wisps.
"Kuros- Partial Enchantment- Phantom Edge"
The greatsword's movement became a blur, and for a single, disorienting moment, it split into three identical copies, each one cutting from a different angle. Arieus twisted with beastly instinct, his cleaver deflecting two of the illusions, but the third grazed his side, the dark-edged steel biting through his armor and drawing a thin line of blood.
Yet he didn't step back. Instead, his grin widened, his muscles flexed like a beast ready to pounce.
"Now that's more like it."
The knight pressed forward, his blade a whirlwind of darkness, each swing carrying the weight of his corrupting power. Arieus met him blow for blow, his cleaver singing through the air with enough force to shatter stone. The ground beneath them cracked under the strain, frozen earth splintering, snow vaporizing from the sheer kinetic fury of their duel.
Then, as if reading each other's minds, they broke apart, putting distance between them.
The Kuros warrior's greatsword pulsed with writhing black energy, the air around it distorting like heat haze over a desert. His armored boots crunched through snow as he slowly advanced, his visor's slit revealing eyes burning with dark power.
Arieus rolled his shoulders, his massive cleaver resting casually against his fur-clad shoulder. "That Kuros of yours," he said, nodding at the dark aura surrounding the knight's blade, "it screams against the world. Like a child throwing a tantrum."
The knight's sword flared brighter at the insult, the dark energy writhing violently. "My Kuros has given me the strength to slay a hundred of your kind, beast. Kuros is the fundamental power of creation, the fire that forged the world."
With a sudden burst of speed that belied his massive frame, Arieus closed the distance. His cleaver came down in a whistling arc..
...only to meet the blackened greatsword in an explosion of sparks. The impact sent shockwaves through both warriors, their feet grinding against the frozen earth, their weapons locked in a trembling stalemate.
"Really?" Arieus laughed, pressing forward until their blades quivered between them. "But do you think it is the only power in this world?"
The knight snarled and disengaged with a twist, his sword leaving afterimages of darkness as he unleashed a flurry of strikes. Each blow carried the weight of his corrupting Kuros, trying to sap his strength, numb his flesh, and unravel his very will to fight.
Arieus gave ground strategically, his cleaver moving with deceptive precision.
A diagonal slash, deflected with a sharp clang, sparks flying as black energy hissed against steel.
A thrust to the gut, avoided by a hair's breadth, Arieus pivoting so the dark blade grazed his armored side.
An overhead smash, sidestepped, letting the greatsword crater the earth where he'd stood.
"Come on?" Arieus taunted as frozen soil rained around them. "Even with your Kuros, you still have patterns. Steps." With a sudden reversal, his cleaver lashed out in a brutal backhand, forcing the knight into a desperate parry.
The knight staggered, breathing hard behind his visor. "You speak nonsense. My power is true. I am blessed. My Kuros..."
"MY KUROS CAN'T BE DEFEATED!"
"KUROS- PARTIAL ENCHANTMENT- CRUSHING BLADE!"
An invisible force slammed into Arieus as a massive blade of condensed dark Kuros erupted from the greatsword, hammering down with the weight of a falling mountain.
"DIEEE!"
Snow exploded upward from the impact, a geyser of white spraying into the air.
"WHAT?!"
Arieus's cleaver had taken the attack head-on and with a grin, he struck back.
He feinted an overhead chop, then spun low, his blade carving a deadly arc toward the knight's legs. The knight barely leapt back in time, only for Arieus to shift grip mid-motion and *hurl* the cleaver like a massive throwing axe. Steel met steel as the knight blocked, his arms shuddering under the impact, but Arieus was already moving. He caught the rebounding weapon midair and drove a knee into the knight's gut.
Armor crumpled. The knight wheezed, the aura around his blade flickering as his concentration shattered.
Arieus followed with a crushing shoulder-check, sending the knight sprawling into the snow.
The knight rolled, blood trickling from his mouth, his visor knocked askew. "How... did you... block that?" he spat. "It goes against the natural order."
"Fool," Arieus mocked, looming over him. "There are powers outside the ability to wield Kuros. Creatures that laugh at your 'fundamental forces'."
A downward smash shattered the knight's attempt at regaining his stance. A follow-up slash screeched along the length of the greatsword, throwing sparks as the knight raised it in a desperate defense. Then, in a flash, Arieus drove his blade through the knight's pauldron, twisting as the man screamed.
"You... can't..be.."
"Natural order?" Arieus leaned close, his breath hot against the knight's ear. "You built your 'order' on lies told by your sages. The true law of this world?" He wrenched the cleaver free. "Only strength is real."
The knight's head was the first to slam into the frozen earth. Then Arieus finished with a cleaver stroke that split armor, flesh, and bone in a single, brutal motion.
A sound like shattering glass echoed as the greatsword's aura dissipated, the weapon falling to the snow, unmoored and lifeless.
Arieus stood, steam curling from his body in the cold air. Around him, the battle had turned, Gurok was already rallying the remaining Krags, their war cries rising as they pressed the advantage against the knights, whose morale had faltered but whose discipline held firm. These were no ordinary soldiers, they were truly elites, and they would not break easily.
Dana walked closer, an arrow still nocked. "What were you and the human talking about?"
Arieus stared at the dead knight, then at his cleaver, its edge gleaming with something deeper than reflected light.
"The reason," he said quietly, "why Kuros users fear me."
He turned, his muscles tensing as he surveyed the battlefield. "Get ready," he growled. "We need to finish this and head back to camp."
His grip tightened on his weapon, his eyes already scanning for the next foe.
"I need to prepare for my reinforcements after all."
------------
Femi was sitting in a small, dimly-lit room, the walls painted a fading yellow that had once been cheerful but now seemed tired under the flickering glow of a single bulb overhead. A little wooden dining table, its surface stained and worn from years of use, stood between him and the others, a woman with kind but weary eyes, and two children, a little boy swinging his legs excitedly beneath his chair and a little girl carefully arranging her rice into neat piles before eating.
The table was filled with the rich, mouthwatering aroma of steaming plates of jollof rice, the grains glistening red with pepper, flecked with caramelized onions, and greased with just enough oil to make every bite irresistible. The scent mingled with the faint traces of woodsmoke and spice lingering in the air, a comforting reminder of home.
Everyone at the table was engaged in a lively conversation, the woman laughing softly at something the little boy had said, the girl giggling as she stole a piece of chicken from his plate, but Femi just sat there, his hands resting on either side of his untouched meal. His dark eyes flicked down at his food, then up at the others, studying them carefully, before dropping back to his plate again. His jaw was set, his fingers tapping lightly against the table in a slow, deliberate rhythm.
The laughter faded slightly as the woman glanced at him, her smile faltering for just a second before she turned back to the children, pretending not to notice the tension thickening the air.
Finally, Femi broke the silence, his voice low and measured, cutting through the warmth.
"So..." He began, his tone deceptively calm. "You all think I'm a fool, ...eh?"