Page 54 of The Ascended
I looked at Xül expectantly, hefting the star-forged blade. "What, are you fighting with your hands?"
His smile was nothing but a wicked promise. "If I even have to lift a finger, something's gone terribly wrong."
The ground beneath my feet began to tremble.
Then I saw them. Fingers, pale and grasping, breaking through the black sand like grotesque flowers blooming. Arms followed, then shoulders, bodies twisting and morphing as they dragged themselves from the earth.
The faceless beings moved with unnatural grace, each clutching weapons that gleamed with their own dark light. They surrounded me in a perfect circle, at least a dozen of them, their eyeless faces turned toward me.
"What—what is this?" I asked, trying to sound more confident than I felt.
"The damned," Xül said, smiling. And then one lunged towards me.
Starlight met corrupted metal, the impact ringing through my arms and into my shoulders. Where our weapons touched, sparks of white-hot energy crackled and hissed. My feet slid backward in the sand as the thing pressed forward—gods, it was strong. Myblade trembled against its dark steel as I fought to keep it from my throat.
Movement to my left. I threw myself sideways just as another blade whistled through the space where my head had been.
Xul cocked his head to the side. "And trust me, you'd rather be fighting these than the corpses buried deep beneath this beach."
I parried a strike, barely. "There's a difference?"
"Oh, starling." He sighed. "The smell alone. These—" he gestured at the soul constructs, "—are far more civilized."
"You're a necromancer!" I gasped between strikes. "Aren't corpses your thing?"
"I'm the Warden of the Damned," he corrected. "Souls are elegant. Refined. Corpses are... messy. I only raise the dead when absolutely necessary. When the situation is truly dire."
"A demonstration in sword-fighting could have been beneficial before this!" I screamed at Xül, barely getting my blade up in time to catch another blow.
"What do you think this is?"
I managed to dodge another strike, then spun to avoid a third. The constructs moved with uncanny coordination, like extensions of a single will rather than individual entities. I slashed at one, my blade cutting through its torso. But instead of falling, the form simply resealed itself, dark energy flowing to repair the damage.
"They can't be killed," I gasped, backing away as they advanced again.
Xül made a small gesture with his hand, and the dark figures froze mid-step. "No. They cannot."
He walked toward me, passing between the motionless figures as if they were merely statues. "What you're facing isn't truly alive, so it cannot truly die."
"Then what are they?" I demanded, still holding my sword at the ready.
"When I say they are the damned, I don't mean wandering spiritsor souls as you might imagine them." He reached out and touched one of the figures. Under his fingers, the form rippled like dark water. "When the most corrupt and malevolent souls die, their energy doesn't transition normally through the afterlife. It remains... tainted. That energy becomes trapped in Draknavor's prison."
"So these are... people?" I asked, revolted.
"No." He shook his head firmly. "Not anymore. What you see is death magic in its purest form—the residual energy of what once was a soul, now stripped of consciousness, of identity, of anything resembling personhood." His fingers passed through the construct's chest, and it distorted like smoke. "These are merely vessels I've shaped from that raw energy."
I lowered my sword slightly. "So they're not... aware?"
"No more than the water in a river is aware of flowing downhill," he said. "They are forces of nature, channeled through my will."
And suddenly, they were attacking again.
A soul's blade scraped down mine with a shriek. I stumbled back, my heel catching in the soft sand. Off balance. Vulnerable. The soul pressed forward, its weapon raised?—
I swung wildly, putting every ounce of desperation behind the strike. My blade passed through it like a brand through water, sizzling and steaming as it cut, its form dissolving into shadows.
My sword was already moving, muscle memory I didn't know I possessed bringing it around to block the next attack. The clash sent vibrations through my bones and left burning white streaks across my vision.
