Summary:The Solars investigate the undercity of Chiaroscuro, and discover an old foe waiting there.
XP:C4, I4, L4, S4, V4, Z4
Tags:< Do I Need To Keep Groveling? | Sol Invictus Logs | I'm Just A Tourist >
Once, Chiaroscuro was the unchallenged jewel of the south: a city of elegant, angular glass towers that rose up into the sky, as translucent azure breakers calmed the ocean's ports and even the streets themselves were lined with adamant.
But today, much of that splendor is shattered: the towers lie broken on the ground, the streets are oft-broken and filled in with mundane stones, and buildings of sandstone and wood rise up between those First Age ruins to house the city's burgeoning population, while many old districts are sealed off entirely, surrounded by salt wards to keep the dead safely within them.
Now, the ancient crab design which the city was built to present from the air is somewhat less clear, and the squatter's hovels and makeshift walls are the primary visual touchstones instead, but the city still has a certain amount of elegant beauty as the Solars approach it from above.
z "It's still pretty, in a broken sort of way, isn't it?" She looks over the towers and shards of adamant, then tilts her head. "Alright then. Let's find us some doom."
Imrama "A tarnished jewel in the crown of the South, yes. We should land, and then meet with Kivir."
Cerin "Yes, it is," Cerin remarks as he joins Zahara on deck.
Colapso "I should be used to seeing old memories rendered into broken, useless rubble."
Lucent "But it never gets any easier." He sighs.
z squeezes Luc's shoulder, then steps back to lean comfortably up against Cerin.
Kivir's place of dwelling in the city, as a relatively well-liked member of the Tri-Khan's family, is in the Old City, where polished glass mirrors still shine with gathered light at night, beauteous red glass streets still run with only minor cracks, and many of the towers are still partially inhabitable. His particular dwelling is in one labelled the Honored Swift Dagger, on the fifth floor --
a relatively posh location, compared to those who can only afford to dwell on the tenth or above.
After landing and proceeding upward, the Solars have to wait only a few moments at the polished blue, green, and gold mosaic door before the jovial Exalt answers.
KivirKhalosh "Aaah, yes, yes, please come in!" he says, gesturing them inwards to the apartment -- a feast for the eyes, brilliant desert colors covering every surface, the sharpness of the glass offset by the sumptuous and elegantly soft rugs and cushions that seem to be almost everywhere, and a small table already set with coffee and refreshments for the Solars to partake of.
Spring smiles at the sight of refreshments.
Imrama greets Kivir with a warm embrace and produces a platter of cardamom cream puffs to place beside the other refreshments.
Lucent "It is a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance, Kivir Khalosh."
Lucent smiled his trademark room-brightening smile
zahara "You have a lovely home, Kivir." She enters, greeting her with a polite bow.
KivirKhalosh bows widely to his guests. "All that is mine is also yours," he says. "In the name of the Tri-Khan, may his reign be long and prosperous, the city of Chiaroscuro is pleased to warmly greet our friends -- new, but well-loved -- from Solaria."
Imrama ::I believe the next move is yours, Cerin. Let me know if you want me to back you up.::
Cerin ::As you wish.:: Cerin's tone isn't really dubious, and he can't honestly claim to be surprised. But he does now know what had bothered him some 10 seconds ago.
Cerin "Greetings, Kiver. Our visit is, alas, not as social as we might like," Cerin begins. "Certain signs and portents and other such matters of prophesy suggest that your city is about to devoured from below."
KivirKhalosh blinks briefly, a little surprised at the... matter-of-factness of Cerin's delivery. "...devoured?"
Cerin "By a swarm of insectoid beings. Possible Hundredfold."
zahara tries one of the pastries.
KivirKhalosh puts his hand on top of his head. "Oh dear," he says, "this is not a good thing."
Cerin "Indeed not. We are here to prevent this."
KivirKhalosh takes a long moment to think on the matter, and something seems to connect for him. "You know," he says, slowly stroking his moustache in thought, "there have been a number of... complaints, recently." He pours himself a coffee, to help him think.
Spring "I recommend the ones with the purple substance," Spring mutters quietly to Zahara.
KivirKhalosh "The Tri-Khan is a courteous and respectful host, of course, so we must investigate carefully all the complaints of those two dwell in the Old City, but recently there have been an increasing number of people who dwell upon the lowest floors who have complained of... strange noises."
zahara takes Spring's advice for her second pastry. "Ah, yes. That sounds like a good lead."
KivirKhalosh "We have not found anything ourselves," he says, "but... we have not ventured into the tunnels below."
Imrama "That sounds like a suitably unsavory place to start." Imrama whispers a prayer to the Father of All Cattle, and eats a cream puff.
KivirKhalosh nods. He rubs his mustache twice more and then begins digging into a pocket. "Our city has quite the underbelly," he says, "but that is not the end of it. What our people call the "Undercity" is the first layer: the old storm drains and underground warehouses, no more than three stories deep, in most places."
KivirKhalosh He pulls something out: a cracked stone tablet, in the shape of a circle with four points, and a red sigil branded on the center. "Beneath even that is Hezed," he says, "Chiaroscuro's lost sister."
zahara "Lost?"
Imrama "Sister?"
Varanim "Nice echo," says Varanim, otherwise scowling thoughtfully out the window.
Lucent "The jewel of the underways." Lucent added. "We had an entire half of our civilization below the ground, you know. It led down below the sea, so anyone coming that way would come past Hezed... it burstled with trade and the strangest of beings."
Lucent "But I always hated being below-ground."
zahara "Fascinating."
zahara "Do you think the doorways down are still open?"
KivirKhalosh "We have sealed them, to keep whatever... things may dwell down there out," he says, and hands zahara his cracked tablet. "But we can grant you access again."
Lucent "I do not see why not. But if even some of the shining towers have crumbled, it is possible some of the tunnels may have collapsed. But we DO have a Chosen of Earth here with us." Lucent smiles to Kivir. "Do please. I want to see it again."
zahara takes the tablet and inspects it, absently smoothing out the crack. "That would be helpful."
Cerin "It would, yes," Cerin nods.
zahara "Shall we go see?"
Lucent "What are we waiting for?" He points, lights forming a road. "Ruins of glory await!"
KivirKhalosh --------
KivirKhalosh Not long after, Kivir stands with the Solars in the street of the city. On the side where they stand, the city is still mostly whole: First Age buildings still standing, roads still in fine condition....
KivirKhalosh Across the line of salt, however, things are very different.
KivirKhalosh "This is one of our Forsaken Districts," he says, looking across the border into the warded shadowland, where holes in the glass seem to look into complete, utter blackness, the faint flicker of ghosts can be seen reflecting in the cracked mirror walls, and a cold wind seems to blow out, even in the midst of the desert heat.
KivirKhalosh "The passage I can grant you access to lies beneath here."
Varanim drips blood in her eye to peer across the Shroud, humming faintly under her breath.
zahara glances over at Varanim - this is her area of expertise. Then she cracks her knuckles, and glares at the blackness. "Well, I suppose we should go before any more time ticks by."
KivirKhalosh The area within the zone seems to be... quite disturbed. Whereas most shadowlands reach a state of natural equilibrium, their necrotic energy stretching out until it is balanced out by the life that surrounds it, these zones have been aggressively hemmed in for centuries -- and so the winds of oblivion that blow within batter at the gates, growing angrier with each moment they cannot escape.
KivirKhalosh Almost immediately, Varanim detects the presence of quite a number of ghosts -- many more than she'd expect to dwell in such a small area, normally, and of a somewhat stronger nature to boot.
Varanim "Oh," she says with some interest, "so that's what happens when you bottle it up and shake it." She frowns. "One second."
zahara draws her Daiklave, testing the edge as she moves forward warily, though she pauses at the salt line
Cerin observes the area around him, as Varanim does ... whatever it is she is doing.
Lucent gestures for the Coronal to break out of his armor, growing from gems to orbs around him.
Spring relaxes.
Varanim reaches into her bag and pulls out a small handful of salt, cupping it in her soulsteel palm and then uttering a single word as it trickles between her fingers. Blazing characters inscribe themselves on the air, expanding to form a cylinder many yards wide around Varanim that no ghost can enter.
KivirKhalosh Cerin spreads his senses out and takes in the broader picture. This Shadowland is perhaps a half a mile in diameter, but unevenly shaped, sticking out more in some places and narrowing in others; it just so happens that a building -- still largely untouched, a squat single-story building with the same red sigil carved into its exterior --
KivirKhalosh sits almost exactly at its center, and tunnels run off downwards from beneath it.
Cerin starts to trace the tunnels downwards.
KivirKhalosh The tunnels immediately begin to split and divide up as they move downward; the only real conclusion Cerin can draw from here is that they go further down than 500 meters.
Varanim "By the way," she says to Kivir, "you're going to have really interesting ghost trouble one of these years if you keep it up."
KivirKhalosh ponders that for a moment. "I am guessing you do not mean that in the good sense of 'interesting,'" he says.
Imrama "Perhaps once we have dealt with the doom of the hour, arrangements could be made to resolve the Shadowland problem that is crippling this once bright metropolis?"
Cerin "That sounds wise," Cerin agrees, and then steps into the shadowland.
Varanim shrugs in what's probably agreement and ambles in, herself.
Imrama follows casually, but unbuttons his coat just in case.
Lucent follows, letting the midnight-blue Pluto Orb lead his way.
zahara "You know, I'll probably regret saying this, but sometimes I miss the days of just exploring tombs and battling the sort of honest monster that just comes straight for you."
KivirKhalosh As the Solars pass into the Shadowland, the reaction is quick. Cold air seems to leak into Varanim's carefully defined barrier, and a feeling of unease seems to follow shortly thereafter.
KivirKhalosh Within what seem like only brief moments, the denizens of the Shadowland have started to boil out -- and they are not happy.
KivirKhalosh Most ghosts have a look much like they did when they died -- the fallen mind's desperate attempt to hold onto some sign of familiarity is embodied in the plasmic form. But these ghosts seem... wrong.
KivirKhalosh Bleached white eyes, oddly gaunt limbs, long albino hair that seems to blow on the chill winds, shrunken faces -- Varanim can tell from the remnants of their clothes that these were once fairly normal ghosts of dead humans, but now they all seem to have been twisted in some way -- and the result seems to be that they keen and wail loudly and beat with bony fingers on the shell of Varanim's protective spell.
zahara "See what I mean? Sure they want to kill us but at least they're honest about it."
Varanim "The po has drive and clarity of vision," she agrees as she moves forward. Her eyes are restlessly flicking between ghosts, cataloging and sorting, noting the similarities that shouldn't exist and slowly building a picture of the underlying intention.
KivirKhalosh As they push through the crowd of ghosts -- a slightly slower process than one might normally expect, given the resistance they're putting up -- the Solars approach the building, and its exterior sigil seems to react to the tablet Zahara is holding -- the doors begin to slide open with a rocky *ktung* even before they have reached its threshold.
zahara "Convenient, that.
Varanim "Don't you think intimidating the doors into opening is a little tacky?" she says to Zahara.
zahara "You just have no sense of style." She smirks.
Lucent "One must respect the classics. They are called that for a reason."
Cerin shakes his head a little, and steps inside
KivirKhalosh The building inside was once quite beautiful, it is certain, but now, the beautiful mosaics that once decorated its walls are scarred and battered by ghostly hands, and its flame-arts -- ancient sorcerous statuary built of captured flames, preserved in magical crystalline shells -- have grown faint and flickery
KivirKhalosh What once would have been an automated gondola, trimmed in moonsilver and white jade, lies trashed in one corner of the room -- it looks like advancement on foot is the way of things here.
KivirKhalosh And at the center, inside the ring of guardian fences and crowd-control structures, there it is: a hole, in the ground, leading down -- and an extremely narrow maintenance stairway running in a spiral along its outside wall.
Varanim moves forward, brushing Lucent's shoulder lightly with her hand as she passes.
zahara glances around as she comes inside, walking over to the gondola and checking it.
KivirKhalosh The roof is staved in, the bars that would hold the passengers in are smashed, and the floor is stained with... something. But it's still got its structural integrity... mostly.
KivirKhalosh Meanwhile, Varanim sifts through the evidence, working backwards from the ghosts' current state to try to reason what once might have happened to them, that she might learn how they came to be this way.
KivirKhalosh The result, as it comes to her, seems... incoherent. Like many people, but with a singular, all-encompassing focus. Something oddly detached -- yet filled with hate. Something alive -- yet suffused entirely with death.
Imrama cocks his head towards the great hole in the floor. "Further down the oubliette, then?"
Varanim "Hmm. Cult?" she wonders aloud, frowning as she nods at Imrama wanders over to peer down the hole.
Lucent "Cult? What sort?" He asked, looking down the hole, atop of Varanim and Imrama. It was good to be tall again.
Varanim "Just a guess. Something has messed with the ghosts outside, but it's a focused group rather than one person."
zahara "Well, I could probably fix this, or we could walk."
KivirKhalosh The path down the hole seems relatively uneventful, visually -- a long downward shaft with a thin stair running around the outside, and a bend quite a bit down the way to take the path in another direction.
KivirKhalosh What is unusual is the sensation that seems to be emenating from below -- an intense feeling, almost like a blast, of pure, unadulterated.... FEAR>
Lucent "... whoah."
Cerin "Ah."
Varanim takes a half-step back, almost bumping into Lucent. "Huh," she says carefully after a moment.
zahara "What is it?"
zahara looks up from her contemplation of the gondola"
Imrama "I do not know, but I would submit that it is a sign we are on the right track." Imrama draws Pentecost, measures the heft in his hand for a moment, and returns the gun to its holster.
Cerin "I think I know what we might find at the bottom of the hole," Cerin remarks, as the fear washes over him.
Lucent holds Varanim. "Are you alright?"
Lucent "... and what would that be?"
Cerin "A being we fought once before, in the Factory City of Denandsor."
zahara tenses at that. "What is it doing here?"
Cerin "It must have moved here, after it withdrew. Or perhaps it is just a being like it."
Varanim "Unless it's going to get better by standing around waiting, let's go," Varanim snaps.
zahara extracts the Bonds from around her waist, and wraps one around her wrist. "Alright."
zahara "Give me a moment, and Il'l make our trip faster." She kneels in the middle of the gondola, after straightening a few beams here and there, then begins to work her spell...
KivirKhalosh It is a matter of but light work, for one such as Zahara: and not long passes before her labors have rendered the gondola functional once again.
KivirKhalosh Meanwhile, the ghosts continue to wail and pound on the outside of the field that Varanim summoned up, eager to get inside.
Cerin "Varanim, I believe it's presence might explain the appearance of the ghosts. It was made from similarly twisted living flesh."
Varanim "Ah," she says shortly, rubbing her temples and listening to the blows on the wall.
Cerin provides a breif description of the being and the fight, as Zahara works.
Imrama examines Zahara's impressive restoration work, treating the ancient gondola with a critical eye.
zahara rises, as the light around her dims slightly, her eyes re-focusing on the room around them. "Now let's see if I can make it go." She grins.
KivirKhalosh Reconstructed, Imrama can see that the device uses a control method he had oft read about: the Three Pillars scheme, also known as the Three Stalwart Captains, a method that involves motions of the hands in the air surrounding three metal bars.
zahara pokes at the controls a bit
KivirKhalosh The gondola shakes unsteadily.
Imrama stands on the opposite side of the Three Pillars from Zahara, and makes a few gentle motions with his index fingers to bring to craft into proper alignment with the floor. "I've never had the privilege of seeing one of these before. Very interesting. Would it offend you if I took the helm, Empress?"
zahara "Actually, I think it may well be best if you do." Another quick grin, and she finds a comfortable seat where she can get a good view
Imrama Once all his compatriots are aboard, Imrama announces, "Ladies and gentlemen, please keep your arms, hands and essence-fields inside the craft at all times. Next stop: adventure!" Before sending the gondola on an unnecessarily fast trajectory down the mysterious fear-hole and into the unknown.
Varanim steps in and stands gripping the rail, looking down grimly.
KivirKhalosh The ship plummets at a deeply excessive pace down into the depths, shooting past markings on the walls pointing the way and black sootstains alike on the way towards the lost city of Hezed.
KivirKhalosh As it goes, the sensation of fear seems to grow stronger and stronger -- a familiar sensation for Cerin and Zahara, but a uniquely pungent and unpleasant feeling for the others.
zahara curls the fingers of one hand around the gondola's rail, shooting the occasional glance at Imrama to make sure he knows what the hell he's doing, her unease at the pace compounded by the palpable fear surrounding them. But she knows this feeling, knows it comes from outside of her. She forces her fingers to release her grip, leaning her head back and forcing the emotion into a howl of laughter
KivirKhalosh As the boat barrels down towards the hidden city, the Solars fear the icy grip of fear on their hearts -- only Zahara seems (unhingedly) resistant.
Varanim As the wind whips in her hair and they fall toward the hot stink of fear below, all the expression seeps out of Varanim's face, replaced by the bleak faraway look that she used to wear in quiet moments after her arrival at the Cascade.
Imrama shudders involuntarily during the barreling descent as dark thoughts cross over his mind: lingering uncertainties about his origins, doubts that he is sufficient to the task before him, and an icy fear of what will come to pass when he finally meets Remembrance of Seven Tears.
zahara leans forward into the wind again, eyes gleaming. "You can't stop us, you can't scare us away."
KivirKhalosh The gondola comes barrelling downwards, downwards, until in the dark tunnels ahead, there starts to be a light....
Lucent grits his teeth, shaking imperceptibly
Imrama Glad for the faintest glimmer of hope in the pitch of despair, Imrama guides the craft onwards towards the light.
zahara turns her face from the wind to check on her companions, "It's just a trick, don't let it get to you. Embrace it!" she shouts
KivirKhalosh Despite the great velocity and the terrifying aura, Imrama brings the gondola to a safe stop at the bottom of the hole -- in a rather sizeable reception chamber, with what look like other tunnels leading out horizontally in every direction, and many other destroyed and ruined gondolas littering its floor.
KivirKhalosh The room itself must have been quite beautiful, once -- abstract bluish-green relief inlays cover the roof, with lines of glowing blue jade set between them at strange angles, lighting the room.
KivirKhalosh One particular tunnel seems to be the one leading directly towards the center of Hezed, and it seems to be the most recently trafficked, with what look like fresh paths through the muck and freshly-moved rocks to clear the way, in comparison to the other, frequently blocked and recently untouched passages.
zahara hops out of the gondola, "Thank you, Captain Stormfound." She salutes him.
Imrama replies with bright words, but with a dimmed tone, "An honor and a pleasure, as always, Empress Zhan."
Spring steps out of the gondola, with an uncharacteristic frown on his face.
Imrama "It is wonderfully convenient that we have a trail to follow. I hope that you will not think it too terribly disfunctional when I say that I would like to find the external source of my unhappy feelings and do something decisive to end them."
Lucent "I think this is an excellent solution to the matter." His teeth clatter. Just a bit.
Varanim "The tunnels here and below slop over with the Labyrinth," Varanim says tersely after a scrutinizing look around, stepping down behind the others.
zahara "Let's go then." She flips her daiklave upward and strides forward, though she is wary of traps
Lucent walks up front
Imrama draws his guns and attempts to cover the party from the rear of the crowd.
Varanim walks in the center, a faint metallic scratching following her steps as she flexes and relaxes her soulsteel hand.
KivirKhalosh The hallways are decorated with elaborate paintings depicting the brilliant and morally upstanding life of humanity in the Age of the Solar Deliberative, as well as providing convenient pictographic illustrations for many of the fine places visitors might be able to visit once they entered the city proper.
KivirKhalosh The hallways branch off to every side, taking gondoliers to every part of the city's outer reaches, but the fear comes quite strongly from the center, and so the group presses on down the straight path.
KivirKhalosh After a moment, a sound begins to grow... a faint chittering sound.
Spring pauses slightly, turning his head and listening intently.
zahara flexes the fist which one of the bonds is wrapped around and half-smiles. "I wonder if there will be a hematite army here as well"
KivirKhalosh Spring's hearing reaches out into the holes and crannies beyond the hall where they walk, and it makes the source of the chittering clear as day to him: a veritable army of twisted, vaguely insectoid creatures -- but ones that seem as if they are woven together in part from human body parts -- waits just outside the hall, spawning and fighting and moving, practically overflowing their bounds.
KivirKhalosh But there is another sound that Spring hears, too, fainter, almost too faint, but still present: the all-too-even, artificial breathing that marks the presence of the dead.
Spring "Hm."
Spring "We seem to be generally surrounded by insectoid monstrosities formed from the flesh of humans, and also, the undead."
zahara "Oh, fun."
zahara "I haven't gotten torn apart in ages."
Lucent "... they turned PEOPLE into this?"
Imrama smiles just a little bit. "Miles below the earth, faced with inchoate hordes of vileness. I have finally brought The Lovers home."
Varanim is silent, but seems completely and utterly unsurprised at Spring's news. Her eyes flicker from one tunnel mouth to the next, sometimes sliding sideways into places where no real structure marks the air, and her breathing is quiet but fast.
Spring glances thoughtfully at the other Exalts, bites his tongue and spits into his palms, where the blood glows dimly burgundy and fades.
zahara "Well, let's get rid of them. Send them on to Lethe or whatever."
Lucent "Call the Kraken. I am not as good with groups as I should be."
Spring "It does seem that we will need to face them, does it not?"
Spring "If they are dead, I suspect Varanim knows a way to make them come to us, or be destroyed."
Spring "They have prepared to welcome us. Let us, instead, welcome them."
Lucent "I hope you are happy now, Empress."
zahara raises a brow.
Imrama "I have a banquet well prepared for our enemies, Long-Awaited Spring."
zahara "Happy enough, I suppose." She waves to the War Bell which hovers above them. "I do enjoy using the Kraken."
zahara steps purposefully down the hall from which the fear emanates most strongly. She glances over shoulder to nod at Varanim, who's preparing her spell. "Come get us, if you dare!" she hollers with another wild laugh. It's always fun being bait.
Varanim reaches up into the air and pulls the Mask of Summers down over her face. Through its crystal and flame disc, a red light glows--her caste mark, a sullen bloody red as she speaks five words that signify ancient pacts with the Neverborn which should never have been made. When she pulls the mask away, the red eye still blazes, and she walks forward to see those who must bow before her.
Imrama paces carefully to a position equidistant from each of the available exits and entryways, holds his arms up in a loose duelist's stance, and waits.
KivirKhalosh The chamber that the group has parked themselves in is a relatively minor switching station, with exits leading out five ways and a cracked gold-patina dome hanging overhead. The chittering starts to get louder and louder.
Spring settles, flexing his knees, and then makes a rather un-stylized gesture; he reaches out an arm, palm up, with all the fingers except the forefinger folded back, and then smiles slightly and beckons his enemy forward.
KivirKhalosh As if they had been waiting for exactly this moment, the doors of the chamber disgorge a faceless, verminous effluence of the crude, creeping beasts, human flesh pulled taut around strangely-built forms, arms and ears and eyes all poking out of where they oughtn't be -- and all amidst them, the crude, twisted ghosts, no shred of humanity even remaining to them...
KivirKhalosh All these things pour out of the tunnels, in the hundreds and hundreds, and charge headlong for the Solars who huddle in the center of the room.
Imrama raises up Kilauea and puffs once on his pipe with glee, some warmth returning to his cheeks as he loosens his fire on the oncoming swarm. He pulls the trigger, and a dazzling phoenix made of golden sunlight pours forth from his weapon, its wingspan greater than his height. It screams a call of avian rage as it plunges towards the monstrous mass and explodes like a death-consuming daybreak.
KivirKhalosh Many of the horrific, unnatural creatures burst open like rotting grapefruits before being consumed utterly by the cleansing flame of Imrama's weaponry.
KivirKhalosh But of course there is what seems to be an endless supply just outside of view, and more rush in to fill the gap....
Varanim "Back," Varanim snaps, and no ghost in earshot can escape the terrible red light that crackles in her voice and flickers about her shoulders in her anima.
KivirKhalosh As one, the advancing ghosts stand stock-still. The grimaces on their face seem to reveal the war of mental compulsions that is going on within what remains of their twisted souls, but ultimately, nothing beats Lord, and the dead bend themselves to one knee rather than advance further.
Varanim looks on her work with neither pride nor disgust. Then she ceases to lean on her staff and takes three precisely efficient steps forward, placing herself at the point of some strange resonance between three kneeling ghosts. She whirls her staff in a long high arc, whistling overhead and slamming down on the monstrosity that approaches.
zahara takes advantage of the pause in the undead advance to lift her hands, the cadence of one of her favorite spells spilling from her lips, the runes swirling around her anima more and more rapidly as they shift from gold to red. The darkness is lit by a heated red glow, the skittering noises and unnatural breathing cut short by a sharp tone from the War Bell, pealing out in a devastating circle around her.
KivirKhalosh Varanim crushes her beast with a sickening wet thwack even as Zahara's bell causes many of the advancing creatures to halt in pain, its intense note ringing in their makeshift ears.
Lucent "Abominations." there is only one light, that of the sun. Only one light, burning as bright as it can. "Wretches." one light burning brighter than any other as it separates. Dawn. Zenith. Twilight. Night. Eclipse. HEAVEN. Six symbols shining bright as they can, striking them six of them where they stand. "Begone."
Lucent "Our quarrel is with your master."
KivirKhalosh Another wave of the creatures explodes into tiny fleshy pieces at the mere touch of Lucent's light.
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